What nursing class at your school has the most failure rate?

~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN · Apr 27, 2010

If a nursing school has a failure rate as high as 25%+, I seriously question that nursing school and their intentions. It seems as if so many nursing schools intentionally try to get students to fail. I am quite happy with our nursing program -- they really want us to succeed and do everything in their power to help us do that! We had an incredibly low fail rate (out of 50 entering students, they predict 5 or 6 of us will fail). Our school also has a very high pass rate for the boards, so they must be doing something right.
I would stay clear of those schools where half the class fails the first semester in fundamentals.

I agree about the half failing thing right off the bat, but our program has high grading standards (from what I see on this board anyway, some have higher though requiring an 80%), we have a full time schedule and we lose some every semester. I believe it was 6 first semester between pharm and fundamentals (I don't remember how many in each class) out of 50 to start. We lost 7-8 in Med.Surge. We just had our Peds final today and out maternity final is next Tuesday. I know a few that said they were on the border but probably won't know who didn't make it until class resumes in the fall if it's not people I am in contact with outside of school, none of my friends are close to failing though so we might not know. At least until August.

Our first med/surge class is the first half of second semester and the second half is when we do the OB/Peds.

Anyway, the past few semesters my school has had a 100% pass rate on Nclex on the first try.

We also don't have a HESI or anything like that. We do NLN testing each semester but it has no bearing on our grades.

So ours must be doing something right also. LOL

It also wasn't a competitive program, it was wait list only and you had to have a 2.5 cumulative GPA from Pre Reqs to get on the WL

sneakymom2011 · Apr 27, 2010

We lost a bunch in Fundamentals. OB/Peds hasn't been bad. Maybe 3 or 4. I don't know, I can't keep up with that drama LOL.

I have heard that med-surge in our school is HARD. And that we've got a bunch of people coming into our class from the previous med-surge class.

I'm not going to listen to what everyone else says. I'm just going to keep on doing what I'm doing. It's gotten me this far, and I'm almost halfway through the program. I may not be at the top of the class- but I'm passing and that's what's most important.

No HESI testing. No NLN testing.

I think the requirements for my school were a "C" minimum in everything.

Now granted- this is for the RN diploma class, which after my class no longer exsists. It's a BSN program starting this fall, and I think the grade requirements were upped.

Cheryl

~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN · Apr 27, 2010

Fundamentals first semester and med/surg the last.
It gets REALLY hard to keep going by the summer semester. You are in the classroom or on the clinical floor while everyone is out enjoying the summer. A lot of folks want to take time to enjoy the nice weather on the weekend. DON'T DO THAT! Stick with your study schedule, because in a lot of programs, there are more NCLEX type questions added to exams each semester.

This is why I did not apply for an accelerated program, I enjoy my breaks to much. I start summer vacation in 2 weeks but I only have class tomorrow is my last full day of class and I have 3 more days over the next 2 weeks after that. I am so thankful I was put on the first rotation of clinicals so I get my time off these next two weeks.

turnforthenurse, MSN, NP · Apr 29, 2010

My school has a very high pass rate, but pathophysiology seems to be the one that gets everyone. Our critical care rotation would probably be the second.

HyperSaurus, RN, BSN · Apr 29, 2010

Our school has a very low fail rate. I don't think we've lost anyone our first semester (Foundations) , but we do have 3(ish) out of 50 on the border and we gained 3 this semester (Med/Surg I). It's kind of amazing to me, because our school's admittance is based solely on GPA with no added weight for science classes, and the minimum GPA for the last couple semesters has hovered around 3.1 or 3.2.

abbnurse · Apr 29, 2010

I think we lost most people during Adult Med/Surg II, and second to that was Pharmacology. Also we lost a couple after our first week of clinicals. :cry: We started out with about 45 students and 36 actually graduated. All but one of us passed NCLEX on the first try, and the girl who failed it ended up passing on the second try.

everlasting · Apr 29, 2010

We lost the a lot of students during Fundamentals. I'm in MedSurg I/OB now, and I have a feeling we will lose a lot after this semester. OB is notorious for being the weeding out class.

~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN · Apr 30, 2010

We lost the a lot of students during Fundamentals. I'm in MedSurg I/OB now, and I have a feeling we will lose a lot after this semester. OB is notorious for being the weeding out class.

See for our class, unless their is a surprise no one knew about, we will probably lose the least amount of people thus far for our OB/Peds class. We only have the maternity final left. Already did the Peds and those that were close passed that one although by a very close call. Our Peds/OB is One grade on our transcript but they are considered separate components with the class, so you have to get a 77% in each to be able to pass it as a whole.

I really thought we would have lost more from rumors I heard, but thus far I don't even know of one and we only had 1 re-admit from previous semester join us.

sneakymom2011 · Apr 30, 2010

The main problem (and gripe) with my program is that we are the LAST diploma RN class. The school changed to a BSN program last year. So if you fail out- too bad so sad- there is no class to fall back on. If you fail out of a class- you fail out of the program. No second chances. You can re-apply to the BSN program, but that's 3 years and you HAVE to start again from scratch :crying2:

So it's kind of ramped up the stress level.

And what really aggrivates me is that we were told in JULY. A month before the program started. And what do you do in that instance? I wasn't about ready to not take my slot. It's taken me forever to get INTO a program, I certainly didn't want to tack on another year.

Cheryl

Meriwhen, ASN, BSN, MSN, RN · Apr 30, 2010

Though we rarely lost more than a couple of students in each class, it was Maternal-Fetal that had the highest fail rate with 4. The problem was that most of them who failed were women who went into it with the attitude of "I have kids, so this class will be easy!"

everlasting · Apr 30, 2010

The main problem (and gripe) with my program is that we are the LAST diploma RN class. The school changed to a BSN program last year. So if you fail out- too bad so sad- there is no class to fall back on. If you fail out of a class- you fail out of the program. No second chances. You can re-apply to the BSN program, but that's 3 years and you HAVE to start again from scratch
So it's kind of ramped up the stress level.
And what really aggrivates me is that we were told in JULY. A month before the program started. And what do you do in that instance? I wasn't about ready to not take my slot. It's taken me forever to get INTO a program, I certainly didn't want to tack on another year.
Cheryl

I'm in the same situation! We started on a new curriculum, so my class is the last one on the old curriculum. If we fail a class, we usually could wait a semester or two and retake it. Now, if we fail, we're done. We would have to reapply, and go through the whole process again. It is BEYOND stressful!

We weren't told until August, when we started the program, and it was too late to back out.

RadfordSN · Apr 30, 2010

Our class lost the most people in critical care, the previous semester's med-surg class did a good job at weeding people out as well.