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There's nothing wrong with CSU, but since you asked ... I knew that my recs weren't that great. They all said good things about me, but that's not what makes a rec good. Two of them were from scientists (which is to say, not nurses) that knew me well, and one was from a nurse that didn't know me well. So my first item of business was to get to know more nurses well in a semi-professional setting. If I were to do it again, I would probably do this by working as a CNA, but as it happened, I was offered a volunteer internship at SM UCLA Hospital. I put in something like 300 hours in about 6 months in a single unit and got to know all the day shift nurses well (and the unit director too!). So I think this time I had pretty strong rec letters. I know some other fellow said that recs don't matter, but I feel like they must? Last year, when I asked RF what I could do better, she said my recs and personal statement were "average". (Really. That's pretty much all she wrote.) From what they said at the info session, I got the impression that a good rec comes from a nurse that knows you and the MECN program well. The better they understand the program, the better they can target what they write to it. So in addition to networking with nurses, you may want to "coach" the ones that write your rec letters. As you may have guessed, my personal statement was also a bit of a mess. I thought it was good at the time, but it really wasn't. It's weird, because after spending so much time at the hospital it seemed obviously bad to me. So I re-wrote it largely from scratch. On top of that, I also had a bunch of UCLA-trained nurses (new grads, RNs, NPs, etc) read my personal statement for feedback. The following is more or less a summary of what they told me. As everyone already knows, you really need a good personal statement for MECN, because there's no interview. It's not enough to just stand out, you absolutely need to explain why you're a good fit for UCLA/MECN. The "master's" aspect (even though it has no practical impact on anything) and the CNL certification are seen as defining features of the program. You need to tie those into why you think you're a good fit. And then there's the diversity bit. It's important. Honestly, I don't have a lot of cultural diversity in my background, but I really think the key is framing whatever experience you have in a positive way. I'm not sure that was clear or helpful or even correct, but I'm going to hit "Post" because I spent a lot of time on it, and I hope it helps someone.

Even though I'm not waiting like all of you, I just wanted to say that this was my second time applying to MECN. I applied for the fall '13 cohort, but I didn't even make the waitlist (in a year where they had 90 seats to fill, no less). That was pretty depressing, and I thought maybe I just wasn't cut out to be a nurse. At that point, though, I still hadn't given it my best shot and decided to at least keep trying a one or two more years. This year, I had a much better application, and I guess that effort paid off. The point being that even if you aren't accepted/waitlisted, it doesn't necessarily mean you're a bad fit for UCLA (or whatever program you want to get into). I was sort of in that boat with you. For the last year and a half, MECN was the only program I had prereqs for. The last 6 months or so I've been taking prereqs for other programs as a backup plan. I was all set up to apply to National University this July if I didn't get in to UCLA. NU doesn't do rolling admissions for their nursing program, but they do have two cohorts per year (and they start pretty soon after the application deadline).

The email asked for an informal response by April 25th, so wait-listed people should start finding out by then.

It is possible to mask recipients, but as far as I can tell, ------------- sent the email just to me. My assumption is that, since it has taken them so long already, they are notifying people as they figure things out (hence the notification online, and the email). Hopefully, there will be another batch at the end of the day (or before)!

Hey ... I'm new here (been lurking for a while), but ... Got my acceptance online! Good luck to anyone who's still waiting! Oh, and my last name starts with an 'S' edit: forgot to mention, I also got an email from -------------- not long after the acceptance posted.