Yuweezy

You'll start working night shift with your preceptor from the beginning unless you're ICU. ICU likes to start you off for day shift for about 15 shifts even if you're hired as nights. Otherwise everything is at nights, and you have SIMS lab or orientation classes during the day.

I had an interview and accepted a position at Banner University PCU on 9/18. However, I haven't received any hiring information nor been contacted by Banner HR. How long did it take for HR to reach out to you guys?

Hi, I am a new graduate RN. Just a little background of myself: I graduated August 3rd this year, and got my RN license on August 23rd. I just got a job at a hospital on a progressive care unit (step down ICU) and will be starting October 16th. I guess I have about three weeks of free time until I start my first career as a RN. I've been brushing up on only my basic nursing fundalmental knowledge and skills because I've been told by everyone that working is totally different from school, and I'll be learning everything all over again based on the hospital's protocols. I believe going in with a positive attitude just like the first day of nursing school would be helpful. I'm going to go with a student mindset and be ready to absorb everything I can. Sorry I didn't break it down to 1,2 and 3. Hope this helps!

I would suggest buying Test Success” and Fundamentals Success” books. They are on amazon or any other websites. I failed my first exam in nursing school and these two books helped me a lot with Nursing style questions. Don't read into the questions. Work with only what you're given in the questions. It's really easy to overthink and make mistakes.

Nursing school sure is really stressful. Instructors making things more stressful than it already is adds on to it too! I hated my instructors for that. I was a pretty much straight A student during my pre reqs, but I got a F on my very first exam in nursing school! That was devastating. There's a reason why they make it very difficult and stressful, because you're gonna be dealing with peoples lives once you become a nurse. My friends told me (I have a lot of close friends who are nurses) when I was going through Nursing school, Everyone goes through it man, it's stressful, but it's attainable. If it was that difficult, there wouldn't be any nurses. Working as a nurse is totally different from school”. It helped a lot. The way I dealt with nursing school stress was ranting with my study groups. No one else really understands what you're going through except your classmates. Just don't complain too much and let it take over your study time haha. Good luck!

I don't know how it is in MA, but a lot of hospitals here in Arizona pay for your tuition if you're doing RN to BSN degree. I would say take your NCLEX first, and try to get a job as a RN. I wouldn't recommend working as a tech, because you're not gonna learn any nursing skills. Also a lot of BSN classes' assignments would be much easier if you have some kind of experience as a RN. Writing papers is gonna be much easier. A lot of hospitals have New grad programs and they do hire ADN. I have plenty of friends who had no experience besides nursing school and started working as RN. You're gonna do great!

Like the previous comment says, tons of people get their degree through online. It doesn't say on your diploma whether you went to school in person or did it online.

I'm assuming your first Clinical is going to be either at a long term care facility or a skilled nursing facility? In my experience most patients enjoyed having nursing students. I don't think I had one patient that didn't want a student doing assessments on them. Of course you're not gonna remember where things are, of course some nurses don't enjoy having students because they are busy. They are people just like you. Knowing everything from the start is impossible. If someone is good at things from the start and get everything right, why even go to nursing school? They should just go straight to being a nurse. Your first semester in nursing school is literally playing nurse”. Consider it as a learning activity and enjoy it. Good luck!

I don't really see that as cheating. A lot of textbooks or nclex practice books come with test banks. You learn how to approach problems by reading the rationales and stuff. It kind of preps you for the NCLEX in a way as well.

My school in Arizona did the same. First semester was fundamentals + medsurg, second was medsurg + psych, third was medsurg + OB and forth was critical care + peds. The studying style would depend on the person but my school mostly did power point lectures. I took notes during class and focused studying those for exams. if there was something that I didn't understand during lecture, that was the only time I read the books.

I just finished the Nursing program through SCC in August. From my experience, it was 1-2 years wait for traditional ADN program and one semester for CEP program. I applied for the CEP program back in May, 2015 and got accepted to start in January 2016. If you have all the pre reqs for CEP, I would definitely go that route. It's a little more challenging because you're taking an extra online class on top of the traditional nursing classes, but in the long run it's totally going to be worth it. I just got hired, and it seemed like hospitals were preferring people with BSN degrees over ADN.

Thank you!

I just finished my nursing degree through Scottsdale Community College this August. I applied for the CEP and AAS program at the same time back in May, 2015 with all my pre-requisites completed, and got accepted for January, 2016 start. I was accepted through Franklin Pierce University (CEP). I had to take a computer science class to fulfill FPU's requirements in Fall, 2015 prior to starting the actual nursing program. Regardless of which CEP program you get into, you're going to take one BSN online class during each normal semester and two online classes over the Summer. The BSN classes consists mostly writing papers, so it's not that difficult. However, you are going to manager your time efficiently. I finished my Block 4 over the Summer, so I put my BSN portion on hold, because I thought it would be too overwhelming. Franklin Pierce is very flexible with your BSN degree. NAU didn't let my classmates to put their BSN classes on hold, so some of them had to drop out of the CEP program during the Summer. I believe some of them got right back in and continued their BSN portion this Fall semester.

For turning in all the required documents, did you have to go in person for anything at all before your starting day? I'm trying to go on a vacation overseas before I start working. Thank you in advance!

Hello! I had my interview for the new grad program at Banner yesterday, and got a call back the same day that I got the position. I'll be starting October 16th at the progressive care unit at Banner University. I have a question to ask. Did you have to go in person to handle all the HR stuff at all before your official starting day? Or were you able to do everything over email? Since I almost have about a month till my starting day, I'm planning on going over seas for a few weeks if I don't have to do anything in person. Thanks in advance!