Some Honesty

honesty? sounds like you're having a tough time, but please dont make everyone think that is how it is for every nurse everywhere.

Where I live, they are trying to recruit us at the hospitals we are doing our rotations at, and are trying desperately, and we are only LPN students (I say only because so many places dont use LPNs in the hospitals that I was amazed at the reception we got).

I know there are some places (like Redwinds?Redwood?red something?) where a hospital closed down and the market flooded with nurses and suddenly there were far more nurses than jobs. But there are also areas like mine where there is such a serious shortage of nurses that the local hospitals are pretty much funding the nursing program in order to get more nurses to hire.

I don't think that this is true everywhere...in my area nursing jobs are pretty plentiful for both new grads and experienced nurses. Unless you are incompetent you should be able to get a job in my area. It may not be the job that was your first choice, but jobs rarely are.

I have seen other posts about not being able to get a job and the economy does SUCK big time right now, but I don't think that the job shortage is nationwide.

Every market is different some have shortages others are saturated. Your area might be one that is saturated. Keep your head up, job searching is never fun and sometimes takes awhile.

There isn't a major shortage of nurses in America like we've all believed but rather an unequal distribution of them, I think.

But really, nursing is one of the best jobs you can have because healthcare is never going away. Ever. I think it's silly to tell someone not to become a nurse because the job market sucks right now. 1) I don't think thats true 2) Who knows how things will be in 2-3 years? It may be less than great right now but it's still a LOT better than so many other job outlooks.

At the hospital where I go to school at they are trying to recruit us like crazy! I got a phone call for an interview 3 days after I put my application in. I've already had one interview. I plan to apply at other places also but I don't see why I won't get the job I interviewed for already.

Wow! What a downer!

I think the job market varries a lot by location. In southern California the job market is not THAT bad. I graduated in December 2008. To the best of my knowledge all of the graduates in my class who wanted to be working (we had a couple of preggos who are taking time off), are either working or have recieved offers to start within a couple of months. In some cases it was not their "dream" job, but to the best of my knowledge everyone who wants work has it.

It helps to think "outside the box," look into LTC, rehab, dialysis etc...

Looking for a job is always frustrating. Personally I hate dealing with rejection, and that's exactly how I take it when I interview for a position and don't get an offer. As a new grad I sent out 61 resumes and got a total of 4 phone calls.

One lady acutally blew me off after scheduling an interview,m waited at her office 2 hours, she never called, never showed. Just as well, if that's the kind of company she runs she can FORGET me ever going to work there. The other 2 were after I accepted the position I am in now, which kind of just "happened.":yeah:

I just recently started getting phone calls about resumes I sent out in January. Things take time sometimes.

The trick is to keep looking, keep thinking and keep a positive attitude.

:down:It really comes down to where you live and where you are willing to live, I currently live in GA, and there are planty of New Grad jobs here with the good old sign on bonuses, tuition reimburse, good benefits, 401K, and other perks and benefits. Sadly for me I want to work as an RN here for about a year to get experiece and then move somewhere warm and sunny so I may be shooting myself in the foot and maybe I would like it more here if I had money in my pocket all the time.

Also by the time I graduate thungs should be getting back to normal unless the President gets his way with National Healthcare and then I think all nurses may be screwed.

Just a thought, not meant to offent just something that is on my mind as I decided to make the sacrifices i will need to so that I can be a NS.

Good Luck!

Christine :heartbeat

Exactly how will national healthcare screw nurses? Every other industrialized nation has it and nurses there are doing alright.

:banghead:That is good to know because I only have 1 friend who is a nurse from England who lives here now, and she told me that gov. regulated, or national healthcare was her main reason for moving here, so I may have jumped to negative conclusions per her statements rather than asking her for more specific details.

She is also quite a bit older than I am, so maybe things were different in England for her at the time when she made the desicion to move her family here, due to the chances of her career being more lucrative, from what she told me.

It appears from your comment that I may have just made negative assumptions from the context of her remarks, rather then asking her for more specifics which, thanks to you, I will do.

I know I have a tendancy to do that, so if I was wrong in saying that, I am sorry.

Thank you,

Christine

By the way, England's NHS is the poster child for how not to do national health care.