What is a hat party and how do I get more information?

guiltysins · Jun 3, 2010

I don't know what a hat party is, but if it is what you said then it is different from a pinning ceremony. For one, at most pinning ceremonies now a days you don't wear scrubs and I don't think anyone wears nursing hats period. So maybe the pinning ceremony replaces the hat party.

llg, PhD, RN · Jun 3, 2010

Don't know if this is the "right answer" or not ... but back in the olden days, when I was a student ... We had a ceremony -- a serious, committment ceremony at the beginning of our junior year of college -- during which we received the nursing caps that we would wear for our student clinical experiences. That was the point of our schooling at which we began taking care of actual patients, began wearing uniforms, etc. "Getting capped" and making a committment to provide good care was just as serious and as big a deal as getting a school pin at the end of the program.

We had a 2nd ceremony (a pinning ceremony) at the end of our senior year, the day before graduation. The pinning ceremony was just for the School of Nursing, of course. The following day, we had "graduation" with the whole university and officially received out BSN degrees.

So, we had 3 ceremonies:

1. Capping -- at the start of clinicals

2. Pinning -- at the end of nursing school

3. Graduation -- university-wide ceremony to receive the academic degree

However ... the expression "hat party" sound very casual to me, not like a formal school ceremony. Perhaps it refers to some irreverent ritual that students did involving their caps when they were finished with them.