Reaching my breaking point with middle schoolers

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Has anyone else ever had a period in time where they've just kinda had it. I had a student come in, no pass. Nope, go get a pass. She rolled her eyes as she left. She came back with a pass saying she needs an ice pack for her finger because she bent it back with her other finger. Full ROM, no bruise, no swelling, no redness, nothing. Give me a break! It's a combination of the attitude, the exaggeration, and the fact that the teacher let her leave class for this. It's also that SOOOOOO many students come in asking for ice and when I ask why, I hear the most ridiculous answers. I almost want to ask them if they have a whole freezer with ice packs at home that they use for every ailment. Ok rant over.

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Specializes in School Nurse.

All. Dang.Day.

"Teacher told me to get ice pack"

Well you said knee has been hurting x 5 days, no known injury, no swelling or bruising.

= No ice pack as I explain my rational.

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Specializes in School Nursing.

#lifeofamiddleschoolnurse

I work in a middle school as well, and these students are so full of sass/attitude. They'll do anything to get out of class... and the teacher's allow it. That's the issue I have here. They don't even check to see if the student's using the nurse's pass actually need to see the nurse. They just let them take it and wander the halls. Sometimes they'll actually end up in my office with some ridiculous excuse, but most of the time the security officer has to escort them back to class.

I as well am having one of those days! ?‍♀️

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Just now, tining said:

All. Dang.Day.

"Teacher told me to get ice pack"

Well you said knee has been hurting x 5 days, no known injury, no swelling or bruising.

= No ice pack as I explain my rational.

THANK YOU!! No seriously thanks for the reassurance. I had a student come in yesterday who said his knees "have been hurting since 2019." Ummmmmm what?? No injury, no bruising or swelling. I said if it's been that long I will call your parents and tell them that it's time to see a doctor and all of a sudden his eyes widen and he says "they only want phone calls if it's an emergency but this isn't an emergency. can you just give me ice?" idk what they think ice does exactly.

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2 minutes ago, kschindlerRN said:

They don't even check to see if the student's using the nurse's pass actually need to see the nurse. They just let them take it and wander the halls.

Apparently the nurse before me would let them hang out in the office but since I've been here and put a stop to that apparently there has been an increase in students saying that they're going to the nurse and not returning to class. The students know I'll send them right back. Admin comes by and asks when they left my office, when they didn't even make it here in the first place.

I just don't get it. If I was ever not in class when I was that age, I would get in huge trouble but that would never happen because I never felt the need to not be where I was supposed to be.

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Specializes in School Nursing.
1 minute ago, nursex23 said:

I just don't get it. If I was ever not in class when I was that age, I would get in huge trouble but that would never happen because I never felt the need to not be where I was supposed to be.

I don't think I even knew there was a nurse when I was in school (if there even was one!) I would have never been out wandering the hallways..

For my kids here it's a mix of attention seeking, seeing what kind of trouble they can cause, and just plainly not wanting to sit in class and learn. I don't understand why administration doesn't crack down more on hall passes. If you don't have a doctor's note, you shouldn't be using the bathroom 5 times in one class period!

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1 minute ago, kschindlerRN said:

I don't understand why administration doesn't crack down more on hall passes.

I completely agree. Administration is doing that here. When I started I was told by the principal not to see students without a pass unless it's an emergency. I sort of didn't care about passes for a while but there is way too much nonsense coming to me. I found out that students were ditching class, coming to me for something small, and then ask for pass back to class but no going so they can wander the halls with a pass. Ever since I started cracking down on passes, I see less and less students but when I do have a student with a pass come in with nonsense it blows my mind why a teacher would let a student leave class for such a small reason.

I have a little nook in front of my office that the deans take students to talk when they get into an altercation. I love it because I have ZERO students coming in my office because the deans will not let them through without a pass.

They also ask me to walkie in any students loitering so an admin can go break that up but I guess there's just so many students not going to class that it's hard for them to be everywhere.

I'm just really getting frustrated with a lot of these students and it's making me wonder if I want to return next year.

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Specializes in School Nursing.
26 minutes ago, nursex23 said:

I'm just really getting frustrated with a lot of these students and it's making me wonder if I want to return next year.

We have a hall pass system as well. The problem is that the teacher's allow student's to take the passes whenever they want. So they don't even have to tell the teacher why they want to go to the nurse, they just take the pass and go. So I do require them to have a pass to see me because I started out the year seeing kids in between classes for non-emergent things. But then I would have to give them a pass to class and they would not show up to class for another 15 minutes after they left my office. So that stopped. Then I tried to have teacher's write a pass with the reason for visit, but I was told this was too much to do for the teacher's because it interrupts instructional time...

I don't mind seeing kids! That's the whole reason why I became a school nurse because the job I was in previously gave me no patient interaction with my kids. But I don't need to see them for unreasonable / stupid things when there are other people / things to be tended to. ?

I think I'm going to stick it out in the MS for another year (this is only my first), and see if I can get some changes implemented. But if things continue like this, I may see about switching to the elementary level or another district.

BTW... as we speak.. I just had a student come in from class wanting to go home because of a wart on his finger... ?

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My complaint is with the teachers who send middle school students, their aides, to my office with instructions to bring back tyelnol or ibuprofen for them. In what universe would that be a good thing??‍♀️

(I might not be very nice in my reply.)

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Specializes in School Nurse.

We send timed passes or their planners. Admin does hall sweeps regularly to find those out for a stroll. A lot better this year with new principal.

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Specializes in OR, Nursing Professional Development.

Soooooooooo just gonna put this out there. Are you sure the passes are legit? I mean, some middle/ high school kids may or may not have snagged an entire pad of presigned passes. Not that I would know anything about that of course.

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Specializes in School nursing.
9 hours ago, Rose_Queen said:

Soooooooooo just gonna put this out there. Are you sure the passes are legit? I mean, some middle/ high school kids may or may not have snagged an entire pad of presigned passes. Not that I would know anything about that of course.

Oh you can put it out there.

I make sure my signature is harder to duplicate when signing passes on my end (and yes I require them for MS and HS and vetoed the idea of the laminated general nurse's pass - so easy to just grab and I want a time and out, please - sorry, trees).

Because of this, we caught a HS student forging a pass a couple years back. Student did get pass from teacher, returned to classroom with it signed by me. Except teacher looked at it and is awesome and raised an eyebrow. Took a photo of it, sent it to me to ask. I was actually teaching a health class at the time and had never even seen the student. Was forwarded to the dean. They had evidence that a student had been vaping in the bathroom at the same time and weren't 100% sure it was this student, but this little nugget didn't help that student at all....

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