UW Seattle BSN Fall 2021

Ang_Do · Apr 23, 2021

Proud to be a UW husky nurse in the 2021 cohort! Got notified at 4:56PM.

To anyone who got declined: I got rejected last year and cried for days. It hurt to think about because it feels like you put so much time and energy into the application only to hear bad news. But try, try, try again! Be resilient. A nurse is a nurse, no matter where you get your degree. My floor has nurses from all places and not once has any patient asked where they got their degrees from. It doesn't matter if its from cc or from uni. Breathe, cry, don't give up.

Looking forward to the future, here are some tips that I got from the advisor for this years application and my own stats.

Grades: I have meh grades. ***

Advisor says she would rather see more work experience, knowing what a nurse does, observing them in their natural habitat, etc. versus seeing a 3.8+ GPA with mediocre experience.

Resume: Follow the directions and template on the application EXACTLY. ***My grades are meh, but resume-wise: 700 hours UWMC, 1700+ nursing home, 80+ hrs volunteer UWMC (three years ago), 20 hours volunteer (most recent). I currently work 0.8 FTE (32 hrs/week) while taking two STEM classes. Work experience is valuable!

Personal statement: - Don't spend too much time thinking of some unique topic and fitting a story to it. Instead, think about a really moving experience for your strength/weakness/cultural humility and reflect on it. She also told me Empathy was one of the most overused strengths when reviewing applications.

Optional statement: I talked about why I got a 2.1 in a class (life got in the way honestly) and why I took an entire quarter off. This is where you go emotional and pour your heart and soul into - improvement -ambition - resilience -self-care. Advisor said, don't need to do the optional statement if you don't need to. You shouldn't use this to write Why You Want To Be A Nurse: this should already be evident in your personal statement.

Letter of rec: I really connected with my nurse. We really had back and forth conversations about the LOR. Examples for every prompt.

Email me if you want tips with your application or if you just want to talk! I'll be here for you. Email: [email protected]

Jenny Johnson, CNA · Apr 23, 2021

Got my rejection about 20 mins ago ..

G9780 · Apr 23, 2021

Congrats to everyone who got in!!
I created a fb group for our cohort, and am excited to meeting all of you.
Search on fb “UW BSN class of 2023”

G9780 · Apr 23, 2021

https://m.facebook.com/groups/675764366525334/

heres also the link ?

stanthenurseman · Apr 25, 2021

Meant to post a few days ago, but I’ve been accepted into UW’s BSN program for 2021 after being rejected last year! Thought I’d share my stats and my experience going through the application process twice.

I did all of my prerequisites at UW and ended with a 3.77. I am currently taking 2020-21 as a gap year and have been working full time as a CNA at a hospital. At the time of the application I had 750 hours at the hospital and 940 hours at a long term acute care hospital. Quite honestly, I don't have much community involvement/service beyond 2 clubs I was in when I was a student at UW. My leadership/teaching experience isn’t too robust either, just a handful of one-off experiences I was apart of. I didn’t feel the need to write an optional statement.

After being rejected last year, I had the opportunity to chat with a someone from the SoN admissions board to get some pointers on how to improve my application. The main things she had to say about my application were:

1) My letter of recommendation was mediocre. I had asked my nursing manager who knew me for about 6 weeks, so she really had nothing to base a recommendation on. The admission person said it was impersonal and just seemed like a template recommendation. So for this cycle, I made sure to establish an actual relationship with one of my assistant nursing managers (at a different facility [my current job] than my previous recommendation) - I set up casual meetings with him so we could get to know each other, asked him about his nursing and nursing school experiences, and had him read and critique my personal statements so he would have everything he needed to write an effective recommendation.

2) My essays were too critical of other people. Rather than focusing solely on why I want to become a nurse/why I would make a good nurse, I wrote things like, “I pay attention to these specific details that other people don’t pay attention to, so that would make me a better nurse than other people” (not verbatim but this is what ended up coming across). The admissions board liked my style of writing, but not the content, so that was a big hurdle for me to surpass this time around. I spent an absurd amount of time editing and trying to perfect these essays, from about September 2020-January 2021. I think had 6 or 7 different people with both nursing and non-nursing backgrounds read and edit them. I tried my best to focus on my experiences as a CNA and to describe these in great detail, ensuring to answer every portion of every prompt - I wrote about what it was like to be on the code team and the many roles of the charge nurse during a code; connecting with patients emotionally as a strength, and time management in a clinical setting as a weakness that I have been improving on (she also told me that when you’re describing your weakness, do NOT try to spin it into a strength [which I did last year], because that would mean you’re just describing two strengths, and therefore not actually answering the question); and some experiences with homeless patients for the cultural humility prompt. Looking back at my essays from the 2020 application make me cringe so much because I was hardly answering the prompts and I wasn’t letting myself shine due to being so focused on other people.

3) This isn’t from the admissions person but from the Future Nurse Club Application Review, and is a bit more minor than the previous two - My resume wasn’t descriptive enough. Last year I had 2-3 sentences per experience, but this year I was told it might be more advantageous to include everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) that I could think of that I had done or seen done by an RN for the clinical experience section - from following infection control precautions to observing RNs perform assessments to following rapid response protocols.

That was kind of long-winded but I wanted to be thorough. Overall, in the moment it sucked to be rejected the first time around, but it has definitely given me the opportunity to grow. Taking a gap year has been incredible for my mental health since its the first time I haven’t been a full-time student. If you got rejected this time around, it may feel bad right now, but there are so many different paths that end with you passing the NCLEX and becoming an RN, and UW is just one of many.

Nursebunny · Apr 28, 2021

Was anyone able to schedule an appointment with an advisor to talk about reapplying?

Ang_Do · May 1, 2021

On 4/27/2021 at 9:29 PM, Nursebunny said:

Was anyone able to schedule an appointment with an advisor to talk about reapplying?

Hi! I remember from last year, they sent out an email in early-mid Summer or posted to the FNC (future nurses club) about signing up for advisors. I remember it was pretty late and I didn't have the chance to talk to an advisor until November or so. As the application due date gets closer, there will be more opportunities to connect to the advisors and BSN1/BSN2 students. I would email the UW SON if you want more info too.

Mahlets · May 18, 2021

Anyone who want a roommate contact me at [email protected]

atlxd96 · May 18, 2021

Has anyone on the waitlist heard back? I heard there had been some movement but I'm wondering how much.

tran00 · May 18, 2021

I haven't heard anything about the waitlist yet, where did you hear that people were taken off of the list?

OldToTown206 · May 19, 2021

I haven't heard any updates since April either. Waitlisted currently.

atlxd96 · May 21, 2021

I was #11 on the waitlist and I was accepted this morning!