NurseMoi

It's a good cover letter and resume. If you're applying to a religious affiliated hospital then I would definitely keep the religious affiliated statements in your cover letter. A lot of these organizations are all about faith, healing and sharing God's love, so they want to know that you share those beliefs and that it is important to you. Sidenote: I once considered applying to a religious affiliated organization and in the application process they posed questions such as "What interests you about working for a faith based organization? We provide coordinated service of spiritual care to patients, their families, and the hospital staff. Spiritual care is affirmed as an integral part of the team approach to healthcare, therefore, we take pride in ministering to the needs of the whole person - body, mind and spirit. Does this influence your decision to apply for a position within our health system?" In your cover letter, instead of saying, "Although I am a new graduate nurse..." I would say "As a new graduate nurse...". In your resume, I would actually get rid of the Medical Skills section as a whole, only because you're not really stating any skills that every other New Grad won't possess as well. It's assumed that you should be trained and skilled in patient assessment, education, medication admin, etc.

Hi Ashley 3H12. Congrats to you! I, too, was recently hired as a new grad and will begin Orientation on November 5th. I was given a lengthy Welcome Packet that details exactly what will be expected of me during the entire orientation process. We will have a Clinical Simulation with Sim men where we'll be evaluated on our assessment skills and medication administration & safety. We'll have a weeklong class room training with Nurse Educators where we'll receive training on many different topics (i.e. IV, phlebotomy, central lines, blood products, respiratory class, neuro class, cardiac class, EKG, etc.) A lot of preparation and modules to be completed prior to the start of Orientation too. We will be evaluated on our competency, performance, teamwork, initiative, etc. It seems pretty intense, especially after being out of nursing school for months. But I'm excited and just sooo grateful to have a J-O-B! :) My plan is to obviously Think Like a Nurse (after all, that's what they hired us to do and BE), Soak up new info like a Sponge, and Enjoy the Orientation process. Good luck to you! :)

Congrats misStaken314!!! The Neuro ICU should be exciting. Good luck on your first day tomorrow :)

So ed25 and misStaken314, any news?? I believe the Fellowship starts next week.

Good luck to all of you. An RN Residency sounds wonderful.

Congratulations! A Step-Down Unit is a great place to start.

RELAX. You will do just fine. Trust. If anything, go back over your question rationales.

Kaplan. I wouldn't focus much on anything else. Our school made it mandatory to pay $300 for the Kaplan program and it was money well spent. Thousands of quality questions covering Everything we learned in nursing school. If you complete the Qbanks, Qtrainers, and Readiness Test -- you will be more than prepared. The Saunders and Lippincottt books were helpful while in nursing school. But the Kaplan questions are much more similar to the NCLEX than anything else I've seen. In fact, our Kaplan representative specifically told us NOT to focus on those type of books unless you need extra help with content review. But honestly, Kaplan has videos for content review too. I graduated in May and really slacked off on studying for the boards until the last week and a half prior to testing. I took the NCLEX yesterday (Aug. 11th) and passed with 75 questions (22 SATA) and PASSED. All I did to prepare were Kaplan questions.