To walk with cap and gown or not?

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As I am sure that many of you do, our program has a graduation for just nursing students and then another with cap and gown. Should I do both or is the cap and gown a waste of time? Would love input! Thanks!

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I would do both of them if i were you! Neither ceremonies wouldnt be a waste of time because its apart of your accomplishment of graduating from Nursing school! Just my opinion! :)

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If you march in your school's commencement ceremony and later decide that you didn't enjoy it and you wish you hadn't bothered, the worst that's happened is that you've wasted a few hours (and whatever the cap and gown rental cost you). If you don't march, and later regret that choice and wish that you had, you can never go back and have a second chance ...

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Specializes in Labor and Delivery.

Oh I would definately do both! Why not celebrate your achievement as much as you can? Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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my school forces us to so I have no choice. Id much rather not.

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Specializes in Trauma, Teaching.

I did both, both times, BSN & MSN. Pinning was for the nursing part, cap&gown was the degree. Got my hood at pinning/commencment, then got wear it with cap&gown. I worked too hard not to get all the kudos I could! plus the celebrations were lots of fun.

My whole family came for the MSN, first time in years all of us were together at the same time. Biggest joy was that my oldest daughter was in the same ceremony getting her Bachelors!

They can be a bit boring and long, but it isn't something you get to do often (28 years apart).

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At first I just planned on doing the pinning ceremony but heck, I'll be the 1st out of my family to graduate from college.....so I'm taking it all in and being a part of MY graduation!!! I/we worked our ass off....we deserve it! :)

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Specializes in Orthopaedics, Med/Surg Acute Care.

This is purely your decision. Yes, you have earned it and if you are really on the fence about it - just do it. You might regret it later. I didn't but I wasn't excited about about the college degree part of it, just the nursing part.

For me I already had my BA from the only college I consider my alma mater. For me the nursing degree was just for nursing, plus it was kind of a step backwards since it was an ASN degree. So for those reasons I never did the cap and gown, just the pinning with my family in attendance. I was also an adult student with the nursing degree, so I wasn't as excited as I was for my first college degree.

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My school does the same thing. I am going to do both because one is graduation w/ school scrubs for nursing students only and the cap &gown graduation is going to be bigger and everybody ( different majors) is going to be there. I want to graduate w/ my non-nursing degree friends :)

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I think you'd have to weigh the pro's and con's that apply to you personally. For me, I'm just doing the Nursing graduation and skipping the larger one with the cap and gown. To spend money on the cap & gown and hours of my time to sit at a ceremony with thousands of people I don't even know seems like a meaningless waste of time and money. To graduate specifically for nursing with 60 other classmates, most of whom I do know, is what matters to me.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Clinical Documentation Specialist.

Of course it's up to you, but I say go for it, you may regret not going later.

Personally, I'll be attending mine. When I told my husband I wanted to get my nursing degree I told him I wanted to do the BSN route. I left school years ago when I was young and dumb and never finished my Bachelor's (unrelated field). I wanted to complete that goal and for me, it will be a celebration of not only my Nursing degree, but finally doing away with the one big regret I had in life, never finishing my degree. I'm going to wear my cap and gown proudly that day (with plenty of tears, I assure you)!

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Heck yeah, go! Why not? It's fun to walk in that cap and gown! It's not something you get to do everyday! If you don't like it later, big deal, like somebody else said, it's only a few hours you'll have wasted. Me, I loved my university graduation! I went to 3 of them the first time around - Chicano/Hispanic graduation, my specific department graduation, and the huge university graduation with everyone! I loved them all! :p Now I'm in nursing school and will go to everything possible again!

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