When did it start getting so difficult to get into Nursing School?

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Does anyone know exactly when it started getting so difficult and so darn competitive to get into nursing school? I remember back in 1976 when I was teaching high school biology that I considered going to back to a community college for a RN degree and the high school guidance counselor where I was teaching told me not even to try that I'd never get in. Me, with a BS degree at the time was told to forget it!

So..who knows when it all started.....the competition for the RN program?:nurse:

There has been a very competitive wait list at the community colleges for ADN programs where I live for at least 15 years (the whole time I've lived there). What I've heard is that it's due to lack of nursing instructors (because they aren't well paid), to limited number of clinical placement sites, limited clinical instructors to supervise students, and to "design" to keep from flooding the market with nurses so wages can increase.

I don't know that those are valid reasons, but those are what I've heard over the years.

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.

I got on the wait list in March 2006, it was strictly number based and went down the list. I finally started Fall 2009. So I waited 3.5 years. :| In 2004 when I started Pre Reqs it was really hard to get in at my school in WA. If you had anything less then 3.8 GPA you could forget getting in. So the problem has been around more then the past 2-3 years

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Specializes in Pediatric Pulmonology and Allergy.

I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.
I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

There are many CC that are highly competitive also. In fact most I have seen are.

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Specializes in Near Future: ED, Future Future: ACNP!.
I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

I'm going to a private school and it's very competitive. AND, I don't have to take "millions" out in student loans. Don't generalize...

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Specializes in Critical Care, Patient Safety.
I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

Speak for yourself. All of the schools around me are very competitive - public AND private, including schools that offer ADN, BSN, MSN to become an RN. I do think it's partially a regional differentiation, but the whole public vs. private thing doesn't make a difference here.

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Specializes in Pediatric Pulmonology and Allergy.

I'm talking about NYC. The more expensive private schools are easier to get into than the city or state funded schools. There are many nursing programs and many new grads being pumped into the system every year. There are not nearly enough jobs for all the nurses who are graduating.

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I know I am getting so frustrated. I am applying everywhere. It's like shut down ... I don't know what to do anymore. I am so frustrated. Can anyone lend some kind of inspiration?

:confused:

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Academics.
I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

The people above have stated what I thought when reading this about private schools. I don't know how much you're paying for your state school BSN, but I bet it's in the range of $50K or more over 4 years. The community college students could say the same about your choices regarding schools.

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I'm not sure how long it has been that way in upstate NY, but when I tried to get in back in 2004, there was a waiting list at most schools. That is why I ended up going for my LPN first.

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I don't think it's all that hard to get into a nursing program. The school I am in is highly competitive because it's a state school. If you want to go to a private school and take out millions in student loans, there are places galore. Many people are going to private schools and taking these huge loans in the belief that they will have a secure career; I feel sorry for them.

Don't think it is a priviate vs public (state or locally funded) thing, as much as supply and demand, with a dash of reputation an a few other things that go into making the choice in higher education.

Yes, public colleges and universities in NYC or NYS are cheaper than priviate, but the later aren't exactly going begging for applicants into their nursing programs. Obviously what does matter is the size of the nursing class versus applicant pool.

There was a time right here in NYC, when one could get through pre-nursing sequence at any or most CUNY colleges with the bare bones 2.5, and still be admitted into the nursing program. No NLN, no HESI, no TEAS, no SATS, no nadda. Priviate schools were almost the same, and it all had to do with the number of applicants (or lack thereof), and number of seats. Remember it wasn' that long ago that nursing programs not only in NY, but elsewhere in the USA were closing down due to lack of interest applicants.

Priviate nursing schools for the most part are built upon and or run along the old hospital based diploma program lines. Once one is accepted into the program, you go for uniform fitting and are a student nurse from day one. Without a pre-nursing sequence to base applicants ability, such schools have always relied upon a various array of exams and data to determine if one has what it takes to complete the program.

NYU and Hunter have pretty much the same board passing rates, so does spending hundred's of thousands produce a better nurse? Well that would require a huge study over a long period of time. Indeed most BSN or ADN schools in NYS range within the mid 80% on average (Wager College on Staten Island has one of the if now lowest BSN passing rates, somewhere in the 70% range) passing score, so if one is judging a nursing program based upon that information, it really does not matter which nursing program one attends.

Much will also depend on if one is simply looking for a nursing program as a means for "job training", and thus the quickest way to get to and pass the boards, versus say someone who values campus life and the whole attending college/university experience. Nursing students at NYU not only have a college campus that spans much of Manhattan below 34th Street, including Washington Square Park, The Village, The East Village, Tribeca, Wall Street Area and so forth, but are able to take classes in Europe and the Middle East as well. Simply put a priviate college/university is going to have vast resources that public schools can only dream about.

These vast resources extend into the nursing classroom as well. State of the art labs and equipment not only in nursing, but core and other required classes as well, such as Microbiology and right down to say French language lab as well.

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There has been a very competitive wait list at the community colleges for ADN programs where I live for at least 15 years (the whole time I've lived there). What I've heard is that it's due to lack of nursing instructors (because they aren't well paid), to limited number of clinical placement sites, limited clinical instructors to supervise students, and to "design" to keep from flooding the market with nurses so wages can increase.

I don't know that those are valid reasons, but those are what I've heard over the years.

Yes, there is a huge shortage of nursing instructors, and there are various reasons for it, but regardless it has greatly hindered the number of students programs can accept.

First bit of the saga began probably when many of you were either not born yet or to young to be bothered:D, the 1980's through early 1990's.

Thus began the era of "managed care" which totally turned hospitals and healthcare upside down, shook it hard and almost left it for dead.

Managed care came into hospitals/healthcare with a clear focus on cutting fat/expenses and thus would drive down costs (where have we heard that before?), and almost nothing was sacred.

Patient stays were shortened, many services were moved to out patient or walk in care, hospitals were forced to examine anything that wasn't a direct service to the patient (and thus generated revenue), and either find a way to make it pay, or do it cheaper to lessen the expense. Laundries were closed and linen either rented (and cleaned) by a service, or at least laundry was sent out, and so on an so forth.

For nursing staff managed care nearly killed the profession. The largest cost to any hospital is labour, and nursing serivce makes up a the majority share of such costs. So what did they do? Senior nurses, those with experience and earning a "decent" wage, but no fault of their own other than merely putting up with working in hospital for so long were eyed as costly and they had to go. All across the USA experienced nurses were either out right fired, or exposed to the wealth of tricks a clincal setting can play when it wants to get shot of a nurse. When this didn't bring down nursing labour costs, next went nurses in general, increasing the nurse to patient ratios.

Voices of course sounded the alarm, but as usual it was mostly ignored. Nurses, and their professional bodies tried to get anyone who would listen to spread the word that not only was having such low number of nurses on the floors dangerous for patients, it was unwise. But did anyone listen, no they did not.

The result of this was two fold; one, as word got out that demand for nurses was low and conditions poor, applicants to nursing programs plummeted. Also those senior/experienced nurses were the pool of future nurse educators, who in some number would go on to get their masters or PhD, and go on to become clinical or class room instructors.

Fast forward to the late 1990's to about a year or so ago, and you have two situations playing out that nurses warned about back in the day, a shortage or nurses, and a shortage of nursing educators. The recent recession may have put a temporary lid on hiring of new nurses, but it also has created conditions where experienced nurses can make more, much more working bedside or in the units than teaching.

So you see boys and girls, this recent boom and bust cycle is not new. It seems every decade or so something happens and there are suddenly too many nurses, then later there aren't enough.

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