This is the refrain I keep hearing from my clinical instructor and others in and around my program. What's your experience? I'm a Level 1 student. I know very well I have all of it to learn, but I don't think I'm a complete lost cause. I make good grades in class, but at every turn I hear someone telling me that good grades mean absolutely nothing to being a good nurse.
Just to validate myself. I always finish my head to toe assessment by the time it's due while establishing a good rapport with my one patient (so far). I have found things during my assessment the actual nurse missed (due to the fact that I have one patient and half an hour to assess them, while the nurse has at least 5 and significantly less time to hover over the same lung spot). I've gotten feedback from the CNAs and nurses on the floor I have clinical on that I'm the one who jumps in to do anything, while many of my classmates huddle and just answer call lights. My clinical instructor has me go in the room with other students to help them with their assessments. I'm the only person in my clinical group she's let do a glucose check and lovenox injection unobserved.
I'm not blind to my faults. Most obviously, I don't have experience. I still very much need someone to validate what I observe, because I'm really not sure I'm what I think I'm observing is correct, or if I'm missing something altogether. And I am most definitely missing assessment findings a real nurse catches. In addition, I struggle with time management. That's why I make the effort to get all my patient work and paper work done as early as I can to shadow a nurse as long as I can. I want to see how they organize their shift and how they deal with all the random stuff I'm not going to see with my one patient. I don't know what all goes in to being an actual nurse on a med-surg floor. Mostly, I don't know WHAT I don't know, but I really try to be aware of that and observe the nurses and ask what clues they got that made them do what they did.
Really, though, I just don't see how getting good grades is going to make me a ****** nurse. Is this something people say to make people who are earning grades they wish were better feel better, or is there truth to it? I'm trying to keep my confidence up, but I hear this sentiment several times a week, and I'm really wondering what I don't even know I'm missing.
In your experience, are the nurses with the highest grades in their class bad nurses when it comes to caring for real patients? If they are, what are their weaknesses, and what can those class-smart but patient-stupid do to improve?
The post is pointless and excuses poor behavior. You are saying that because "you" feel grades do not matter to whether someone is a "class smart" or "patient stupid". So what are you actually trying to do other than make yourself feel better because your grades are bad. So you as humans often do try to make yourself feel better by putting down others. You want to justify something by saying that people who get good grades are bad nurses. You have ZERO evidence. You show me a peer reviewed journal article showing that nurses who earn As have worse patient outcomes than C students. Find it and then find 10 more. Posting on a message board that good grades make bad nurses based on NOTHING but your own inadequacies is stupid and makes nursing as a professional career look bad. Go earn your bad grades...no one is stopping you. Then when you can't get into grad school you can complain that they don't know anything and you are a "good nurse".
i guess this is what happens when you read a title and go into a blind rage without actually reading the post..
I had a 3.85 GPA for my BSN. I have to be honest. There is a general trend that it seemed the smartest people, the people I envied most in nursing school, totally and completely fell the heck apart in the real world.
I was quite glad I struck the sweet spot between being a good student and a good nurse and it sounds like you might do the same too!:)
The post is pointless and excuses poor behavior. You are saying that because "you" feel grades do not matter to whether someone is a "class smart" or "patient stupid". So what are you actually trying to do other than make yourself feel better because your grades are bad. So you as humans often do try to make yourself feel better by putting down others. You want to justify something by saying that people who get good grades are bad nurses. You have ZERO evidence. You show me a peer reviewed journal article showing that nurses who earn As have worse patient outcomes than C students. Find it and then find 10 more. Posting on a message board that good grades make bad nurses based on NOTHING but your own inadequacies is stupid and makes nursing as a professional career look bad. Go earn your bad grades...no one is stopping you. Then when you can't get into grad school you can complain that they don't know anything and you are a "good nurse".
Did you even bother to read the original post? And are you not putting the OP down in your own post, like you are so harshly criticizing the OP for doing to others? The OP was NOT saying that good grades = bad nurse. In fact, they were questioning it because they had heard it from other people. Just thought I would fill you in since you clearly did not read the post. There's not much of a point in asking for academic journals when you don't even know what the person is arguing. Good luck.
The post is pointless and excuses poor behavior. You are saying that because "you" feel grades do not matter to whether someone is a "class smart" or "patient stupid". So what are you actually trying to do other than make yourself feel better because your grades are bad. So you as humans often do try to make yourself feel better by putting down others. You want to justify something by saying that people who get good grades are bad nurses. You have ZERO evidence. You show me a peer reviewed journal article showing that nurses who earn As have worse patient outcomes than C students. Find it and then find 10 more. Posting on a message board that good grades make bad nurses based on NOTHING but your own inadequacies is stupid and makes nursing as a professional career look bad. Go earn your bad grades...no one is stopping you. Then when you can't get into grad school you can complain that they don't know anything and you are a "good nurse".
Windsurfer usually I enjoy and agree with your posts, but this one is so left field I have to say something. You very clearly have misconstrued OP's post, or didn't bother reading it at all. I think you owe the OP an apology for jumping the gun like you just did.
I am responding to this without reading others' responses. I don't usually hold popular opinions. However, here are my two cents:
Do not let anyone drag you down for getting A's. There is absolutely no truth to good grades making a bad nurse. Period. In fact, to say that is not very rational. It implies that nurses don't really need to know the curriculum, and that the only important thing in nursing is bedside manner. This simply isn't true, and if it were, why are we all going to school and taking these courses, if knowing the curriculum really isn't that important.
However, it is also important that we remember that perfect grades a perfect nurse absolutely does not make. Commitment to improvement in bedside manner should be just as serious as the commitment to good grades and learning curriculum.
Don't let these people's words beat you down. Be proud of yourself while still maintaining a level head and you will be an excellent nurse!
I have read through this post and want to give a reason I have also heard and believe that "A" students don't make good nurses. Now, before I give you the examples, not ALL "A" students make bad nurses, only the ones I have dealt with...
I went to school with some pretty smart nursing students, some were straight A, Type A students who were top notch at taking tests.
I went to school with some pretty smart people who sucked at taking tests and still graduated, but could not pass the NCLEX.
I also went to school with people like me, Type A, straight A, but had to work my butt off to pass tests. I passed the NCLEX first try!
The people who I believe were bad nurses took to the books like fish to water, several of which continued on to get their BSN and MSN. I watched them in action during clinicals and a few after at the hospital we work. Here are my observations: Their people skills were horrible. They tried but could not TALK to people, you know converse to get more info. One of my former classmates felt so above the rest of us since she had gone on to get her BSN that she used the CNAs as though they were her personal slaves and didn't change incontinent pads or answer bells. She didn't last long on my floor! Actually, I don't think she even is working in nursing now.
Another classmate wants to "rule the world" and went on to get her MSN so that she can work in management, and I quote "run this hospital like it should be run." Again, her people skills were lacking a tad!
The third on my list started out as an LPN and was in my RN class. She corrected our instructors constantly, told our clinical group how we were supposed to do everything, and got straight As on tests because she had a lot of clinical experience with meds and such during her 10 year career as an LPN. I worked with her occasionally in the hospital setting after graduation. She bounced from floor to floor, then to several other facilities because she sucked at being a nurse! I say that with pure honesty, I witnessed her nearly kill a patient because she knew better than the MD and "held" a med. I ran into her recently, guess who no longer works in nursing?!
Yes, straight A students can be good nurses, but it also takes: common sense, the ability to listen, the ability to comprehend, a sense of self (know your limits), the ability to work as a team, and above all else...the desire to care for others!! If you don't truly want to be a caregiver, if you just want to make a paycheck, if it is a job that you see as a stepping stone to something greater.....please don't become a nurse. Be a nurse because it is your passion, I know it's mine!!!
This is so, so late, but I wanted to thank you all for your comments. I continued to hear the same sentiments throughout the semester, and it was discouraging. However, I also got to see lots of students and their theory grades. I saw students with good grades and good clinical practice or mediocre clinical practice, and the same with students with mediocre grades. I also saw students with good grades and an inability to perform reasonably acceptable head to toe assessments. In my totally complete expertise of experiencing level 1 and half of level 2, I think y'all are completely right. My new clinical instructors are much more balanced, and I'm feeling a little more intrinsically competent, aside from the numerous opportunities I've had to completely screw everything up :).
I'll keep working on getting As in theory and getting better clinically, because if I've learned anything in the first parts of nursing school, it's that I have SO MUCH to learn. Thank y'all for giving me a huge confidence boost when I needed it, and also a reminder that grades are not all it takes to make a good nurse.
Just curious as a nursing student how you are judging nurses? You are able to determine "inability to perform reasonably acceptable head to toe assessment" Are you qualified to make this judgement? What is "mediocre clinical practice"? What is your criteria for a mediocre assessment? Be VERY careful when judging others. You can get yourself in a real mess when you have no idea what you are talking about. Pretty scary when someone with very limited schooling and experience who thinks they know what is automatically "right".
Grades may not be "all it takes" to be a good nurse..but good grades ARE required to be eligible to sit for the NCLEX. Also if you plan to go to grad school you need excellent grades. Being a "good nurse" is very subjective. Your view of a "good nurse" may not be the same as mine. Have an open mind to the fact that when you see something you don't think is "good" it may be appropriate to the situation.
Don't listen to a single word of that BS. I'm a hard working and well liked by patients, nurses, and fellow CNAs CNA. And I'm a straight A student too. And I'm going to be an excellent nurse. I look people in the eye and I say what I mean and I mean what I say. It's called honesty and integrity and the dishonest and corrupt are terror struck by it. Be confident in who you are and let the chips fall where they may.
Okay, that's just silly. Making straight As in school is no guarantee that one will be a good bedside nurse. However, making straight As doesn't doom one to being a bad nurse. That is just complete bunk.
I don't judge nurses assessment skills, because I certainly don't have the knowledge and experience to do so. I do feel somewhat confident that a student who can't adequately go through the motions of the listed steps on our check of sheet of a head to toe, or even help to clean an incontinent patient, is someone I would consider mediocre at best. I do admit, I have a strong bias against nursing students who are unwilling to do the "dirty work" of nursing.
My definition of good for now, for me, is getting As in theory and getting good evaluations from my clinical instructors and positive comments from the nurses I work with. The only criteria I claim as mandatory are being able to go through the motions of nursing to eventually learn enough to be a good nurse, which I so far define as knowing what is and is not appropriate and necessary to the situation.
Really, my goal is to NOT get into a mess of what I don't know. My original question was, what is the novice nursing student with good grades and no experience missing. I did make the title click-baity, because I wanted the perspective of everyone.
elijahvegas, ASN, RN, EMT-P
508 Posts
i guess this is what happens when you read a title and go into a blind rage without actually reading the post..