RUSH BSN-DNP Fall 2019!

elizabeth1019 · Mar 15, 2019

Just had my interview this morning. We should hear by april 5th

Lanntis, BSN · Mar 16, 2019

20 hours ago, elizabeth1019 said:
Just had my interview this morning. We should hear by april 5th

How did it go? Is it conversational? Anything to know for it? I'm a bit stressed out about interviewing over a phone. I've never done that.

tiffany1998 · Mar 17, 2019

Hi all,

I know I do not belong here, but I have a question i'd like to ask. I'm in my first year of nursing school (BSN), and once I graduate next year I plan to go for my DNP the next fall. Do you all think this is a good idea? Or do you recommend I wait and gain more experience before applying for PMHNP?. Thanks.

elizabeth1019 · Mar 17, 2019

Hey Lanntis, I interviewed with Michelle, who's an assistant professor but she will also be the program director in a few months. She was very nice, she told me at the beginning of the interview that she had certain questions given to her by Rush to ask interviewees. It was about 6-7 questions, I can't really remember. My interview lasted about 45 minutes. Its definitely a traditional interview but I would feel your interview out and see if you can make it more conversational. Michelle was very nice and open and I felt like I could do that with her. I've only done a couple phone interviews in my career and its always nerve racking! And can be awkward; my best advice is to think about how excited you are to be getting interviewed, rather than focusing on how nervous you are. Your actions are a reflection of how you're feeling. So put a positive spin on it! I actually live in Chicago and tried setting up an in-person interview with Michelle but unfortunately our schedules did not match up.

elizabeth1019 · Mar 17, 2019

Hey Tiffany1998,

I will always be an advocate for new grad nurses getting experience before going back to school. I have seen and worked with lots of NPs who went straight to grad school after undergrad, and they just do not have a grasp on what the real-world healthcare system is like. However, my experience comes from ICU & ER, where you need to be extremely clinically competent to be able to do your job. I understand that PMHNP is very different because clinical skills are not an important factor. However, you'll be hard pressed to find any high-quality DNP program that will even consider your application with no real nursing experience. You can absolutely find lower-quality DNP programs who will take anyone into their program because all they care about is $$$. But then you will graduate 4 years later, with no real nursing experience and your resume is not going to even be comparable to new NPs who had 5-10 years of nursing experience before getting their PMHNP.

Of course, it is your life and your career. If you know you want to get your PMHNP, I would try to get experience in an ER that has a high census of psychiatric patients. That way, you are getting experience with the psychiatric population but you also get tons of exposure with regular medical patients, traumas, pediatrics, etc. At the end of the day, people have TONS of medical issues. And a lot of psychiatric patients you will see will also have lots of co-morbidities. Its invaluable to have experience with a wide-range of diseases, different patient populations, etc. And it will set you ahead of the curve in your PMHNP classes. A lot of people on these threads tell people to get true psychiatric experience on a psych unit; obviously, this makes a lot of sense. But I've found it incredibly beneficial to work in an ER where I'm not exclusively seeing psych patients so I can understand how issues like DM, CHF, asthma, etc impacts psychiatric care & medication administration. I would say about 50% of the psych patients I see in the ER have medical co-morbidities.

I could go on and on about this. But at the end of the day, you have to make the decision for your career. I believe you will be a much more effective, compassionate, successful PMHNP if you get just 2 years of nursing experience before pursuing DNP.

Lanntis, BSN · Mar 20, 2019

My interview ended up lasting about 1 hour and 20 minutes, we had the rapport going and good conversation so hopefully, that's a good sign. We will know soon enough.

On 3/17/2019 at 4:26 PM, elizabeth1019 said:
Hey Lanntis, I interviewed with Michelle, who's an assistant professor but she will also be the program director in a few months. She was very nice, she told me at the beginning of the interview that she had certain questions given to her by Rush to ask interviewees. It was about 6-7 questions, I can't really remember. My interview lasted about 45 minutes. Its definitely a traditional interview but I would feel your interview out and see if you can make it more conversational. Michelle was very nice and open and I felt like I could do that with her. I've only done a couple phone interviews in my career and its always nerve racking! And can be awkward; my best advice is to think about how excited you are to be getting interviewed, rather than focusing on how nervous you are. Your actions are a reflection of how you're feeling. So put a positive spin on it! I actually live in Chicago and tried setting up an in-person interview with Michelle but unfortunately our schedules did not match up.

Tarzana25 · Mar 27, 2019

Hi everyone,

I applied for the PMHNP program at Rush with the application deadline of Feb 1st. I was notified on March 11 to schedule the interview and had my interview on March 25 with Assistant Professor Alice. The interviewer introduced herself, talked about her role at Rush University, described additional professional accomplishments and explained that throughout the interview she would be asking a few specific questions. From what I remember, I was asked to describe my experiences with applying my leadership skills, experience/example with cultural diversity, what I had done to prepare for the program, and where my strengths and weaknesses were within the curriculum. There was a question related to the DNP Project. The questions were intense, but the interviewer would chime in at times and join my thoughts and ideas, which was comforting and made it feel more conversational.

I am really hoping that we all get accepted into the program. Good luck everyone!!!

Lanntis, BSN · Mar 27, 2019

6 minutes ago, Tarzana25 said:
Hi everyone,
I applied for the PMHNP program at Rush with the application deadline of Feb 1st. I was notified on March 11 to schedule the interview and had my interview on March 25 with Assistant Professor Alice. The interviewer introduced herself, talked about her role at Rush University, described additional professional accomplishments and explained that throughout the interview she would be asking a few specific questions. From what I remember, I was asked to describe my experiences with applying my leadership skills, experience/example with cultural diversity, what I had done to prepare for the program, and where my strengths and weaknesses were within the curriculum. There was a question related to the DNP Project. The questions were intense, but the interviewer would chime in at times and join my thoughts and ideas, which was comforting and made it feel more conversational.
I am really hoping that we all get accepted into the program. Good luck everyone!!!

Good luck to us all! Are you out of state as well tarzana?

Tarzana25 · Mar 27, 2019

I'm in Southern California, but I am looking forward to making some trips to the Chicago campus ?

Lanntis, BSN · Mar 28, 2019

2 hours ago, Tarzana25 said:
I'm in Southern California, but I am looking forward to making some trips to the Chicago campus ?

Nice. Hopefully we'll all make it and be a small close-knit family cohort together for a few years ❤️ !

vhfhflzzz · Apr 3, 2019

Today is decision day! Anyone hear anything? Im really anxious!

Tarzana25 · Apr 3, 2019

I am anxious as well!!! My interviewer told me that decisions would be made today and notifications would be sent out by Friday, April 5.