Tampa Bay CNA Courses - Evening and/or Weekend?

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Hi everyone!

I'm considering becoming a CNA for experience while I'm saving up to go back to school to become a nurse. I checked the FL Board of Nursing website for CNA courses, but the most updated list of schools they have is from 2006, and it looks like many of the courses in the St. Petersburg/Clearwater area are no longer in existence. Has any one recently taken CNA courses in the Tampa Bay area, and can you recommend a school or organization that offers them? PTEC only offers them in the daytime, and I need to do evening/weekend because I work full time.

Also, do employers care where you went for the CNA prep courses, or do they mainly just look at whether you're certified? Any luck getting evening/night work?

Any replies or advice would be very much appreciated!

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No one knows of any courses in the Tampa Bay area? This is concerning. :(

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Try Leary Tech. School 813 - 231 - 1907. You can also try Brewster and Erwin both are also Tech schools. All three are in Tampa. Personnaly I avoid the private schools as they are VERY expensive and I think you get just as good training at the Tech schools

Mary

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No one knows of any courses in the Tampa Bay area? This is concerning. :(

Check new papers so many CNA courses at nigth and on the weekend, i wnt to Medical Prep of Pinellas call them727-768-3633, the have nigth and weekend and only 250$ one week or 2 weeks program, also www.medicalprepofpinellasinc.com

Good luck, maybe this help

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I am in the same boat as you - I have a FT job now but want to get the ball rolling on my CNA certificate to get some experience (and extra $$) before starting nursing school. I am taking the course at the Florida Medical Prep (St Pete area) for approx $250. There is also TampaBatCNA.com but this is about $650 and only during Mon & Tues during the day. I do not believe that the employers care where you went to school to obtain your CNA, as long as you went to classes. In Florida, you can challenge the test without going to classes but I think the employers look down on that because you really don't have the knowledge that you need to start with. Good luck and I hope this helped.

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http://www.doh.state.fl.us/mqa/cna/lst_training.pdf

you can try looking here :) hope this helps and good luck

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Jace,

That's the one I originally went to that hasn't been updated since 2006, and when I called, they said that they haven't updated it since then, so unfortunately alot of the information (at least in this area) is outdated.

I appreciate everyone's replies! I think I'm going to be taking the 2-weekend course they just posted at Florida Medical Prep in a couple weeks and then challenging the cert. test. Wish me luck! :)

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Jace,

That's the one I originally went to that hasn't been updated since 2006, and when I called, they said that they haven't updated it since then, so unfortunately alot of the information (at least in this area) is outdated.

I appreciate everyone's replies! I think I'm going to be taking the 2-weekend course they just posted at Florida Medical Prep in a couple weeks and then challenging the cert. test. Wish me luck! :)

Hi ;) Please let me know how it is ,will you test with prometrcs??? I am in Fla. as well, about 40 min from tampabay. Im taking weekend only courses too.Hoping to test sometime in Aug.=]..

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Hey,

I'm looking into that medical prep of pinellas course. Can someone who's taken it tell me how it went? Did you feel prepared for the CNA exam? Thanks!

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I attended the FL MEd Prep course last Aug and did the test/passed on Oct 4th. They give you a study manual the first day and go over some of the book. Be sure to read the entire book at home! There are a lot of questions on the test that the instructor does not cover in class. You will have a multiple choice test and a skills test. In all, I believe it was 21 skills that were learned and each skill can have on average of 10 steps that need to be done in that order and correctly. You also need to study those at home. I just pretended I had a patient in bed. I studied alone. I took the class 2 Sat's and 2 Sun's and was done. I had to wait about a month for the test so if you do not keep the skills fresh in your mind during the waiting period, you are sure to fail. Good luck!

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If you just want to pass the exam, most of the schools can help you with that. I went to a test prep class and learned all of the skills exactly as the State of Florida Board of Nursing wanted them to be performed. I passed the test first time.

Unfortunately very few of the skills learned to pass the test are performed that way in the real world. Almost none are done the way I was trained.

The video course mentioned here in the CNA forum is great. It teaches the same skills in detail that the test prep schools and the State of Florida BoN teach and require. Two sources same training, pass the test, skills aren't used in the real world.

If you think you'll go to work and be asked to do a bed bath and the two basins will be in the drawer along with the soap and the towels will be on the cart and so will the bed blanket and you'll have fifteen minutes to bathe a resident gently and thoroughly you might need to move into an Assisted Living Facility certified for psychiatric residents yourself.

If you think you will pas the test and be hired immediately as a CNA earning $11.00/HR with no experience, guess again.

The tesp prep schools and the state are cranking out CNA's like a meat grinder. And none of them are worth a rats patootie. Sixty to a hundred of them apply online or in person for every CNA job within the first morning it is advertised. Three people with a year or more of experience will be considered for the job, one will be hired. Lather rinse repeat.

I hope those with a nursing vocation will continue to get certified, work as CNAs, attend nursing school, and live, love, and grow in the field. But there are too many inexperienced CNA's on the job market who simply got trained, even state approved training, who have no idea what the job is or means. Some simply took the advice unemployed => health care always is and always will be hiring => test prep => CNA => gimme a job.

That doesn't work well anymore around here. Others may have a different story. I do encourage you to go for what you want. Just be prepared for a brutal job market and to prove yourself worthy in the first week of anyone spending a moments time to help you along. We are't cruel or unkind, we have just busted our butts helping new CNA after new CNA who walked off the job in a week mumbling, "Golly, I didn't know it would be hard work. Funny how the manequins were much easier to bathe than a real person."

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Consider the Tampa Bay Chapter of the American Red Cross. (They also have sites in Pinellas and Pasco county.)

At the test site there were so many unprepared people who were frantic because they didn't even know how to wash their hands (according to the Prometric guidelines). Many of these folks came from 1-day prep courses or expensive schools....they spent over $100 on books and weren't even taught the fundamnentals. It was sad to see so many hopeful candidates walk out of the test site with a non-passing letter because they weren't trained properly....not to mention that they will have to wait another month and pay additional fees to retest.

The Red Cross training was comprehensive, inexpensive and included clinical hours...I had a job in home health the day after graduation and a month later I passed my Prometric State Exam (as a challenger) on my first attempt (last Friday). I am considered a "challenger" because the Red Cross is not a school per se, but they offer a CNA prep course.

You can honestly tell the difference between those who are prepared and confident with their training and those who were mislead....so can potential employers.

Best of luck!

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