Quick help needed!

[MJB2010]

I am in my last semester of Nursing school (ADN) and I am trying to put together a resume to start sen ding out apps for residencies. I am not sure how to format or state my clinical experience from school. I think I should probably put the floors I was on (telemetry, medical floor, pediatrics, maternity, ICU rotation, SNF floor/rehab should I also include the short one or two week rotations we did with OR, ER and places where we just observed? What kind fo info should I include for each clinical placement?

Does anyone know where I can see examples?

[llg, PhD, RN]

List them on a separate sheet of paper. On your main resume, state your school, your degree, and your anticipated graduation date. Then state that a list of your school clinical experiences is attached. On your main resume, you might list any special projects you did or electives you completed that directly relate to the job for which you are applying.

Then ... on your attached list of clinicals ... you can list the place, the amount of time, and anything you want to say about the skills you learned/practice there.

As someone who reads lots of resumes, I think that's the best way to handle those student clinicals. If you try to put them all on the front page of your resume, they just clutter it up and hide the key facts that you need to convey. Doing that also looks like you are "over-valuing" those experiences and trying to pass them off as being equal to job experience -- and that makes you look bad. It's irritating for the reader to have to wade through all that detail when they are just trying to discern the basic information on their first glance at your resume -- and you don't want to irritate the reader.

Be a little more modest by putting them on a 2nd page -- present for anyone who wants to see them, but clearly listing them as student clinicals and not as job experience.

[PostOpPrincess, BSN, RN]

As someone who helps review some of these candidates, clinical orientation, unless done in the Congo or some similar highly-decimated non-U.S. geographical area, doesn't impress me nor my colleagues at all. A new nurse is a new nurse is a new nurse. Period.

Make it short and sweet--sell yourself on other value points.

[MJB2010]

Thank you for the excellent advice! Now I was planning to list my summer Externship with a preceptor as work experience, that is good right? And as an older student I have a great work history from my previous career, but that is not clinical or healthcare. I was thinking of doing a chronological resume with work or experience highlights, so that way I can list my most recent jon (as an NA) and the Externship, but I also think my past work history is important since I worked at my other job for so long. It is so hard to decide what to leave off and what to leave on. Years ago I had a job that was clinical (as a phlebotomist) but that was before my career type job, should I include the phlebotomy experience even though it is from 2000-2002?