Yeah, you're probably reading the title and are thinking: *eye roll* "Another Nursing student who thinks they deserve a better grade than they earned." I promise you, it's not that.
I am at a clinical site for clinicals, and the evaluations I am getting are absolutely nit-picky and I am wondering if this potentially could constitute as harassment. Why? Because it is negatively affecting my grades. I have gotten written up for the following:
-"Student takes too many notes."
-"Student carries around notebook everywhere. This shows the student is 'carrying around notebook excessively to avoid patient-care encounters'". WTH???
-"Student asked about the IV procedures regarding another clinical site." (They didn't like that I asked that).
-"Student doesn't show initiative." Even though I do! I ask to do things. I insert IVs in patients, I do vitals, I perform tests, I put ECG 12 leads on, assessments, etc. My previous clinical site gave me great evaluations, and this site it's ridiculous.
-"Student made nurses appear stupid to patient by asking to retrieve a warm compress on a patient with difficult veins (Yes, you read that correctly). Additionally, student suggested looking on different areas of an arm before proceeding with contacting an I.V. team, making the nurse appear as though she did not know what she was doing." I was trying to be helpful, and as you can see, taking initiative at this point gets me in trouble (again!)
I've had it with my clinical site, and my director is not helping me whatsoever and I'm tired of it all. I've had so much anxiety around these people it's not even funny. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I can't take it anymore! Please, anyone have any advice? I ask my director, she says, "Learn to be adaptable." I AM. Some Nurses let me do things, some don't, and the ones that don't write me up for not doing anything. And the worst part is: it's going to drop my average :(.
Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.
1 hour ago, MotoMonkey said:
Let me, once again, try to get this all straight. Because there is a less than ideal system it is ok for frustrated nurses to punish students or treat them with less respect? Students who do not have a choice as to the nurse they are stuck with or the facility and unit they need to learn on. That is what I am getting out of this. Few acknowledge a lack of professionalism or common courtesy from the nurse who wont have an adult conversation with the student that was assigned to them but rather leaves poor evaluations after the fact. But many are quick to label the student, who has not been in the clinical setting for a decade and is trying to feel out how to act in these clinical situations, as a "jerk" or as someone who lacks social skills and self awareness. Talk about nurses eating their young.
Actually you have gotten a lot of feedback that has nothing to do with the above, but that is what you are focusing on. Maybe that is what you have done with the situation on your floor, maybe not. None of us were there, so we are offering up potentials for you to utilize. You did, after all, come here looking for opinions, yes?
The things said in your review were petty. That doesn't matter very much since you are the only one with something to lose, so get rid of the notebook, learn to read the room and get through your semester. Then you will be done with it. Feeding your indignation would do you a grave disservice.
If a nurse is that easily made to feel stupid, then they have issues. They are human beings, just like you, however. You stepped on their toes. People here have taken time out of their day and schedules to point some things out to you that you may or may not be able to use in improving yourself. Some of them were phrased kindly, some more harshly, most just flat honesty on what they could see maybe going on from the words you chose to describe it.
Nobody is eating you.
Take what is valuable from this, practice the self assessment so necessary to being a good nurse and keep what you think will make you a better one in the long run. Discard the rest. We are, after all, only strangers on the Internet. The more you think like a victim, the more you will be one. There's an old quote that goes something like "Argue for your limitations and sure enough, they are yours"
Actually you have gotten a lot of feedback that has nothing to do with the above, but that is what you are focusing on. Maybe that is what you have done with the situation on your floor, maybe not. None of us were there, so we are offering up potentials for you to utilize. You did, after all, come here looking for opinions, yes?
The things said in your review were petty. That doesn't matter very much since you are the only one with something to lose, so get rid of the notebook, learn to read the room and get through your semester. Then you will be done with it.
If a nurse is that easily made to feel stupid, then they have issues. They are human beings, just like you, however. You stepped on their toes.
Nobody is eating you.
Take what is valuable from this, practice the self assessment so necessary to being a good nurse and keep what you think will make you a better one in the long run. Discard the rest. We are, after all, only strangers on the Internet. The more you think like a victim, the more you will be one. There's an old quote that goes something like "Argue for your limitations and sure enough, they are yours"
I am not the OP, simply commenting on the rhetoric I see going back and forth on this thread, thanks though.
Moto, it goes both ways. The nurses have no choice whether they get "stuck" with a student so you have two people just trying to work with the the hand they are dealt. Also, although this may not be the case with the OP, there are always two sides to a story and we don't usually get both. I have had students and orientees who continually tried my patience with their "unteachability" or unwillingness to change their behavior. On the flip side I've had days where, because of other circumstances, I have not handled things as well as I could have. I fault the schools for putting the facilities in this situation and the facilities for fobbing it off on the nurses who are already doing their best just to get their own work done.
I certainly agree that there are two sides. We never have the benefit of seeing a clear picture of both sides. I am just trying to play the devils advocate and point out that the OP may not be a socially inept jerk who is trying to undermine their nurse. But rather a human that is trying to navigate this new culture and system they have been thrown into. The system sucks in both directions and the people who are making the decision to put this system in place are not the ones being burdened by it. I think that both staff and students should be speaking up and trying to change the system for the better rather than misplacing their frustration and bitter feelings on each other. Though that is a topic for another day and another thread.
I really took an interest in your post. I read most of the responses and found them all to be incredibly insightful and well spoken and I will definitely be using all of these wise words as I enter my own journey.
I just wanted to throw this out there in hopes it could provide you some encouragement. ?
I have been working with a very large organization for the past 6 years. For 4 of those years, I had constant run ins with upper management due to what I thought was me taking initiative, but was being perceived as overstepping and sometimes even challenging authority. I was even placed on probation for this and honestly I thought it was just ridiculous. Although coming across the way that I did was never my intention, it took me a lonnnng time to figure out that it doesn’t really matter what my intentions are if those behaviors are being perceived negatively by the person/people I’m directly dealing with or reporting to at that time.
I was so used to a manager that allowed me and encouraged myself and my colleagues to think outside of the box, make suggestions, speak up, etc. Then we had a new manager who was the complete opposite and I had a very hard time adjusting to her style of managing. I figured out in the end it’s all about the delivery, timing, self awareness, and our own judgement calls. I learned it is never appropriate to correct someone, especially someone in a higher up position, in front of a patient if what you’re saying could potentially or in any way seem undermining to a patient or the provider. It creates anxiety, doubt, even fear in the patient because they are already in a vulnerable state, whether they show it or not, and having someone make a comment that might seem harmless could really negatively affect the patient. Now, maybe if you saw water dripping on the floor and offered a towel to help clean up that’s one thing and it’s totally ok to ask if they would like help with cleaning it. But I think what might have been a better approach in your case would be to wait for the nurse to complete her work, observe, wait until you are out of the patients room, and ask something like, “Are there any suggestions you would have if a pt has difficult veins?” If she says no, and you have heard otherwise, write a small note to self and ask your professor. Leave it alone.
It seems crummy and I totally understand where your frustrations are coming from, but you have to look at every moment you spend on every site and in every class as if you are in an interview for your future job with future colleagues.
Remember, nurses are people too. There are some people that just don’t naturally click with other people due to personalities and trust me I have dealt with wayyyyyyyyy worse. I literally got screamed at by an MD because somebody forgot to green dot his patient on EPIC and he didn’t know I wasn’t working with him. Lol. This won’t be the last encounter like this I can assure you. Cheer up, take a breath, don’t take any of these suggestions personally — just know every single person on this thread I can guarantee has dealt with something similar at some point and it will pass and get better! Just stay as under the radar as possible and you will be out of school before you know it.
Sending hugs and high fives to you, friend! You got this!
Specializes in 26 yrs ER, Dialysis, HH, Education.
IIg, I completely understand where you are coming from and I do agree with what you are saying. I've often wondered why a school would out themselves in that position - hiring an instructor without a knowledge and skills base. I've worked hard to get where I am and I keep up with my skills and certifications and I realize the hospital does not know me from Adam. I do know the concerns are real. I've worked with other instructors that have little to no experience before becoming an instructor and I just literally have to shake my head. Yes, you need an advanced degree to teach but you also need to have worked to gain experience. How can one think they can accurately and appropriately teach if they, themselves, do not have the ability to do what they are requiring from students. I think every nurse needs to work a minimum of, idk 5 years or more, before getting an advanced degree and)or to teach. Just because one graduated and passed the NCLEX, doesn't mean they are a good or bad nurse...it simply means they passed the requirements to work in this field.
Just because one graduated and passed the NCLEX, doesn't mean they are a good or bad nurse...it simply means they passed the requirements to work in this field.
Specializes in 26 yrs ER, Dialysis, HH, Education.
1 hour ago, not.done.yet said:
Actually I am an educator myself now ? I am sorry you took my reply so negatively. I feel passionately about the subject and I have never seen the BON requiring the students to function under the floor nurse's license. I seem to have stepped on your toes somehow by verbalizing my opinion and for that I apologize. You are taking something personally that was intended as a discussion point. Perhaps I could have worded things better.
I too apologize if I took the meaning out if context. This is also a subject I'm very passionate about. I absolutely love nursing, even when it rears its ugliness and I've always wanted to end my career teaching. I don't think there is an easy answer to this problem, as it isn't back and white but instead has a bunch of other muted colors. Schools need to do better, higher only truly qualified instructors - ones that have actual experience and not just obtained their degree. Facilities need to do better by having adequate staff during the times when they know they will have students. They get the schedules ahead of time. Nurses need to do better by eating at home and NOT eating their young once they are at work. Lastly l, students need to do better in realizing they are still, in fact, learning. Just because they've had some experience as a tech, EMT, CNA or whatever - important roles true - but it does not, will not, cannot equate to being the nurse.
Thanks for your apology and I hope you accept mine as well. I love good discussions.
That's fine, llg, but none of it requires you to pass the CI role onto staff members who are caring for an assignment of patients.
For example, you could choose to allow only CIs who have been through a program of your design that is under your control or that is facilitated by the university but has been vetted and approved by your organization.
You could commence a credentialing process to approve anyone serving in the CI role in your facility.
This students-with-staff-nurses thing is legally and financially convenient for the organizations involved, while disadvantaging patients, nurses, and students...two of those groups of individuals also being paying customers.
I agree the system stinks ... but if we insisted that all clinical faculty had secondary jobs with us, where we could control their clinical education, etc. the schools in my region would close. They have trouble finding reasonably qualified faculty as it is. We need the students to supply us with future staff. We can't block that many from coming. So we need to reach a compromise -- where reasonably qualified faculty bring students and stay with them to supervise their interactions with patients and staff, augment their teaching, etc. ... but where the clinically competent/expert staff retains control of the actual clinical care. We are a tertiary care hospital and the patient care is too complex to expect someone (e.g. faculty) who doesn't do it regularly to maintain sufficient competence. We reach a compromise that is less than ideal, but it works well enough to satisfy most of the players.
I've worked hard to get where I am and I keep up with my skills and certifications and I realize the hospital does not know me from Adam.
For some people, the section I quoted above is the critical piece. An instructor might be quite proficient, but if we don't "know them from Adam," we can't trust them with the patient care. And most schools today just don't have the long-term commitments with their clinical faculty to pay for long stretches of orientation for them in the hospital to demonstrate their competence for us.
Coming up with a compromise is the best we can do at the moment.
Hospitals (health care corporations) want control of as much as they can possibly wrestle control of. The advent of them growing into behemoths such that they are the sole providers of care across large geographic regions, the employers of nearly everyone they allow into their midst (multiple disciplines), the owners of their affiliates, the owners of the health plans that pay for the care they provide...has made that very clear.
It is not in patients' best interest for HCCs to take over the education of nurses. What a travesty that would be. We already have a problem with nurses who who have had little opportunity to distinguish between their duties to patients and their duties to business people (employers). HCCs barely recognize nurses' ethical obligations, and in fact are routinely the originators of ethical conflict for nurses. They have done nothing to prove themselves worthy of the opportunity to increase their involvement in the education of nurses. Nothing.
@llg I trust that you very much believe the perspective you have shared here and are legitimately concerned about the patients and I respect that. But others have a much more opportunistic motivation; that's why their preferences have not been accompanied by efforts to actually accommodate the situation properly.
Nurse SMS, MSN, RN
6,843 Posts
Actually you have gotten a lot of feedback that has nothing to do with the above, but that is what you are focusing on. Maybe that is what you have done with the situation on your floor, maybe not. None of us were there, so we are offering up potentials for you to utilize. You did, after all, come here looking for opinions, yes?
The things said in your review were petty. That doesn't matter very much since you are the only one with something to lose, so get rid of the notebook, learn to read the room and get through your semester. Then you will be done with it. Feeding your indignation would do you a grave disservice.
If a nurse is that easily made to feel stupid, then they have issues. They are human beings, just like you, however. You stepped on their toes. People here have taken time out of their day and schedules to point some things out to you that you may or may not be able to use in improving yourself. Some of them were phrased kindly, some more harshly, most just flat honesty on what they could see maybe going on from the words you chose to describe it.
Nobody is eating you.
Take what is valuable from this, practice the self assessment so necessary to being a good nurse and keep what you think will make you a better one in the long run. Discard the rest. We are, after all, only strangers on the Internet. The more you think like a victim, the more you will be one. There's an old quote that goes something like "Argue for your limitations and sure enough, they are yours"