Daniel, RN in TX

First, congratulations on earning your degree and your RN. My recommendation for you would be to start out working in a Long Term Acute Care Hospital (LTACH) or a skilled nursing facility. Most acute care hospitals will want you to have either the experience they are looking for or your BSN I started in nursing in 1992 as an LVN. I went back to school and earned my ADN Degree, passed NCLEX, and got my RN license. The hospital I had worked for five plus years would not hire me for an RN position because they required either 3 years of experience as an RN or a BSN with a GPA 3.5 or greater. The drive behind this is the push for hospitals to achieve Magnet status which requires 80% of their staff to be at least BSN prepared. I was fortunate to land a job in a small community hospital that took my LVN experience into consideration. I have since earned my BSN and I am currently working on my Master's Degree. LTACHs and SNFs usually do not have the same requirements for experience/degree preparation. Many of them still employ LVNs and are receptive to hiring RNs with an associates degree and minimal experience. Now, it may not be the job you want or the one you dreamed of, but it will give you a solid base of experience and provide you the stepping stones needed to start and advance your nursing career. Lastly, I would advise you to move forward with your plans to obtain your BSN. The more you advance your education the more doors of opportunity will open up to you. Stay positive, do not get discouraged, just take the bull by the horns persevere. Best wishes to you. -Daniel

Nursing school is not tough through the basics: A&P, Micro, Nutrition, Pharmacology, etc. because most of that is simply memorization. However, when you begin your actual nursing - medical/surgical courses, OB, Pedi, etc. it can get a bit trickier until you learn the art of "thinking like a nurse" and you have grasped an understanding of the basics. There is a method for studying for nursing exams and a way to read nursing exam questions that they should teach you. After you have mastered the art of thinking like a nurse, it gets a bit easier. There is an abundance of time that you will need to spend reading, preparing, writing, and studying as the volume of work that you will be expected to complete is a lot. Just get organized, tackle one thing at a time, stay focused, and do not let yourself fall behind. It is not so much hard as it is a lot of work. You can do it! You got this! Also, congratulations on starting your journey in nursing school; the hard work will be worth it!

The decision to move toward an 80% BSN-prepared nursing profession by 2020 was based on research data and not a hidden agenda of kicking nurses out of the profession. There is a plethora of peer reviewed studies that show the data supports the fact that higher education among nursing staff improves patient outcomes. If the data supports having a BSN or higher results in better patient outcomes, then why should the nursing profession not move toward this goal? Remember our profession is about the patients that we care for and not our personal needs or wants. Advancing the nursing profession is not only a "best practice", but moreover, it is the right thing to do. In 1992 I became and LVN, but as the years passed I saw my practice pretty much dissolve and become almost obsolete when it comes to hospital nursing. Because of this trend, I made the decision to return to school in 2011 to obtain my RN. I completed my ADN Degree and passed NCLEX in 2013 proudly claiming the title of RN. I found when I graduated with my ADN that I was pretty much in the same boat as I was with my LVN. Hospitals were NOT interested in hiring ADN- prepared nurses. Thus, I quickly returned to school and in December of 2015 I completed my BSN. Currently, I am working on my Master's degree at age 50. With this said, I understand the frustration that many ADNs are feeling with the push toward all BSNs. I get it! However, I do not believe the push for RN to BSN has anything to do with "getting older nurses out of the way". In fact, most of the hospitals that I am familiar with have grandfathered their "seasoned ADNs" (they did not do that with the LVNS) allowing them to stay until they retire. Today, many hospitals have stopped hiring new ADN and LVN/LPN nurses. I do believe that there will always be a place within the nursing profession for ADN &/LVN nurses, but their place of practice will shift toward nursing care facilities, skilled facilities, home health, outpatient services, and non-clinical roles such a Utilization Review. As healthcare continues to evolve and become more complex it is going to require the knowledge/skill set of nurses who are well educated and remain current in their knowledge in order to meet the future demands of our practice. If ADNs wish to work in or remain in the acute care hospital setting and they are not seasoned experienced nurses within 10 years of retirement then they should be required to earn their BSN. Nurses should not just sit back, cloak themselves in victim hood, complain, and wish that the advancement of the profession will some how stop, but rather we need to rise up and do what it takes to meet the current/future demands of our chosen profession.