A local high school (San Antonio) is looking in to adding a RN program within the high school curriculum. The outcome will be a high school diploma and an associate degree in nursing at the age of 18.
I personally feel this is a great way to get more nurses in the field, at the same time, it worries as the brain of some 18 year olds are not all that developed and need more maturing.
also how will the program work? Nursing school is difficult, as it should be, how will the school accommodate all those nursing courses and high school courses simultaneously?
In my area, nursing homes and some hospitals are now hiring LPNs due to the shortage and salary cost of RNs. I don't know about the ASN for HS students. A lot of adults struggle with balancing their other life activities with nursing school. The responsibility of being an RN is pretty heavy for an 18 year old in my opinion. I say this as a person who became a nurse at 22. Bringing back the LPN to more high schools may be a better step. There again, it would take some time for many 18 year olds to be able to be responsible for a unit full of nursing home patients as LPNs often are.
I know that years ago, many people becwme RNs and LPNs at young ages. The maturity level was different back then. I don’t think the changes are necessarily all a bad thing. We have since recognized that the frontal lobe does not completely develop until mid twenties and we have changed our philosophy in raising children. They are not given as much responsibility as young now.
I grew up in the latch key kid era. Now, there are laws as to when a child can be left home alone. Usually around 12. I was babysitting for my neighbors at 11. I also moved out at 18, had full time employment, my own health insurance and my own apartment. Now, we allow kids to live at home much longer and by law, they stay on their parents insurance until they are 26. It used to be 18.
We cannot have the same expectations from kids today that there were 30-40 years ago. Heck, today we don’t even let our kids cross the street without an adult until they are much older. Where I was going to the neighborhood store for stuff when I was 9 or 10, I would have never let my 10 year old ride his bike across busy streets. I’m just as guilty as others with that on some things.
We have young, early twenties kiddos on our unit that I feel can barely deal with being a nurse. There’s days I cringe from listening to them. But putting teenagers in these situations? No way.
I think working on their prereqs is a great idea. Having them become CNAs, also a great idea. Full fledged RNs? Nope.
Specializes in UR/PA, Hematology/Oncology, Med Surg, Psych.
It feels like a 'dumbing down' of the RN profession. People would be in an uproar if 18 year olds could graduate HS and have earned a degree in teaching or engineering, how about as a physical or occupational therapist?? Or a social worker, maybe an accountant?? Nope the country would never go for that. But a nurse, oh that's ok? I'm shocked that any nurse would find this a reasonable idea.
AJPV
366 Posts
And I thought we had maturity and professionalism problems with a lot of our 21-24 year old new grads!