Where are all the young nurses?

[bestallaround]

I have worked as an LPN for nine years. I have always been the youngest nurse on staff. Now, I am 32 years old and still the youngest among the LPNs, RNs, and NAs on my floor(that's about 45 people). Where are all the young nurses? Who is going to be working with me when all the older nurses retire? When we discussed this at work, we speculated that the young people are getting in, finding out what it's like, and getting out fast.

[PatMac10,RN, RN]

In my program there are 3 of us who ate under 21. I'm the youngest in my program. I started at 18 and am now 19. I will graduate when I'm 20. By the that time the other 2 will be 21 hoing on 22. We are on the way. We are in an ADN program and most of our graduates the past 12 years have been offered a job before graduation has even taken place. I live in rural southeast NC. ADN and BSN new grads don't have too many problems getting jobs around here.