A Nursing Student checking in
I’m now officially a nursing student. Today was my first day, and what a day! It began with orientation at 10:00. Lots of professors in and out of the room congratulating us on making it into the program. It is a hard program to get into, after all! I was told today that 125 applied and only 30 were accepted. I know that only 30 are accepted each semester, but I'm not sure how accurate the 125 is. We went over the packet of materials sent to us in the mail to clarify any questions. This took about an hour. Then we tried to get set up to take 2 assessment tests. It took another half an hour to iron out the bugs for that. This left us with only an hour to take 2 tests so we only took the 40 minute one. I’m not sure when we’ll be taking the other one. These tests turned out to be on a website that I think may prove very useful. It’s basically practice testing that helps prepare you for the NCLEX. None of the tests count for or against us in anyway. It just familiarizes you with the type of questions you’ll experience.
After a hike down the road to a deli catering to university students and specializing in pizza and Greek food, we started our first class—Nursing theory. Beginning with a few more welcome speeches by various professors, we each were told to introduce ourselves. Now we had just done this in orientation, and this was the same bunch of students. But I found it interesting anyway because it was a smaller room, you could hear better, and I’d have to hear those names a few more times to remember them all. Besides the “normal” first time nursing students, we had an EMT, an x-ray technician, 2 phlebotomists, and somebody who had just finished his master’s degree in exercise science all pursuing nursing degrees. We also had about 3 associates-degree RNs pursing their BSN.
The nursing department is changing their whole approach/philosophy in teaching this year. I guess we’re the guinea pigs. Everything will be taught from Orem’s self-care deficit theory of nursing. In a nutshell this philosophy approaches nursing from the standpoint that all individuals seek to have self-care and nurses are only involved when there is a deficit—in other words, they can’t care for themselves. I think they focus much more on getting people back to self care as quickly as possible, as well as not getting involved when it’s not necessary. It also involves cultural issues such as religious beliefs against certain treatments with an emphasis on respect for each person’s background and belief system.
We were all given the following questions to be answered as our first assignment:
I chose nursing as my profession because I believe nursing is…
I believe that the core (heart) of nursing is ….
I believe that the “focus” (main purpose) of nursing is….
My vision for myself as a nurse is that I will ….
I have this friend who told me all her answers are “the money” or variations thereof.
After this 2.5 hour class, my afore-mentioned friend and I decided to take the elevator up to the second floor since it was just around the corner and the stairs were all the way at the other end of the building. So we get in, the doors close, and I punch 2. Nothing. Punch 2 again. Still nothing. So Megan punches 3—we start to rise, and she immediately punches 2. Doors open on 2nd floor. We got off and proceeded around the corner in the direction we thought we should logically go. Everything was lit as normal, but we noticed that there was nothing in the rooms we passed. We saw several doors labeled “operating room—do not enter” and “x-ray room—do not enter.” Being the bold person she is, Megan was opening one “Do not enter” door after another with no results. We came to double doors blocking our progress, opened them and found more hallways leading nowhere. We wandered around in circles for a while, but only encountered more doors, more hallways, more dead ends, and more empty rooms. We were giggling quite hysterically by this time and feeling a bit like we were in a great maze. We finally found another elevator and made haste to ascend to the 3rd floor thinking maybe we could cross over that way. This time there were voices and inhabited rooms, but still not the 3rd floor we were used to. We kept walking down hallways until we stumbled upon the nursing section. We made a dash for the stairs and descended with haste to the 2nd floor. This was now familiar territory. Feeling confident once again, we decided to see if we could access the forsaken part of floor 2 on which we’d been lost. We finally discovered that going into a stairwell presented a door on the other side. We shoved it open and discovered our “operating room” once again, only from the other side. So close, and we couldn’t figure it out! So much for our adventure of the day! We decided that this building must have once been a hospital.
Our second 2.5 hr. class was Assessment which we began in the computer lab. We were instructed on how to access things on Blackboard for assignments, documents, and our eventual exams. We were also given usernames and passwords to access the online segment of our course hosted by the publisher.
During the reading of the policies and procedures portion of the syllabus, the professor read one that made me sit right up and take notice. “Swimsuits, halter-tops, or T-shirts may be worn during lab sessions in which you would need to remove outer clothing in order to practice assessment techniques.” OK! SCAREY THOUGHTS!! This is not going to be a comfortable class for me! We’re going to have to take off our clothes in a class of 30 people—and mixed at that! Now what do I do??? And I thought the uniform was complicated! Oh Lord, how much more am I going to have to endure? And what was that about respecting patients' cultural and religious beliefs? How about student nurses' cultural and religious beliefs--and make that a Mennonite student nurse while you're at it!
After another half hour of lecturing, I emerged from my first day at 6:30 p.m. with eyes glazed over. I was told Sunday at the Student Nurses Picnic that you feel quite overwhelmed for the first half of the semester. I think I’m beyond overwhelmed—I’m petrified! How am I going to manage all this reading and studying on top of working 40 hours? Lord, I’m going to need much bolstering and some extra brain cells.
All the sitting and thinking overwhelming thoughts produced one positive effect. I felt a need for some serious movement (I think I may be running away on the inside). So I went home, changed into comfortable clothing, and hit the Riverwalk. The temperature was quite pleasant as was the scenery, but it was oppressively humid. I didn’t mind at first because I was still a bit chilled from sitting under an air conditioner vent in my last class. But I was soon covered in a sheen of sweat, and by the time I had walked a mile and a quarter, I was beet red and every stitch of my clothing was soaked, and I don’t usually sweat that much.
Now after some sustenance, I must hit the books. And thus begins my first semester as a Nursing Student.
After a hike down the road to a deli catering to university students and specializing in pizza and Greek food, we started our first class—Nursing theory. Beginning with a few more welcome speeches by various professors, we each were told to introduce ourselves. Now we had just done this in orientation, and this was the same bunch of students. But I found it interesting anyway because it was a smaller room, you could hear better, and I’d have to hear those names a few more times to remember them all. Besides the “normal” first time nursing students, we had an EMT, an x-ray technician, 2 phlebotomists, and somebody who had just finished his master’s degree in exercise science all pursuing nursing degrees. We also had about 3 associates-degree RNs pursing their BSN.
The nursing department is changing their whole approach/philosophy in teaching this year. I guess we’re the guinea pigs. Everything will be taught from Orem’s self-care deficit theory of nursing. In a nutshell this philosophy approaches nursing from the standpoint that all individuals seek to have self-care and nurses are only involved when there is a deficit—in other words, they can’t care for themselves. I think they focus much more on getting people back to self care as quickly as possible, as well as not getting involved when it’s not necessary. It also involves cultural issues such as religious beliefs against certain treatments with an emphasis on respect for each person’s background and belief system.
We were all given the following questions to be answered as our first assignment:
I chose nursing as my profession because I believe nursing is…
I believe that the core (heart) of nursing is ….
I believe that the “focus” (main purpose) of nursing is….
My vision for myself as a nurse is that I will ….
I have this friend who told me all her answers are “the money” or variations thereof.
After this 2.5 hour class, my afore-mentioned friend and I decided to take the elevator up to the second floor since it was just around the corner and the stairs were all the way at the other end of the building. So we get in, the doors close, and I punch 2. Nothing. Punch 2 again. Still nothing. So Megan punches 3—we start to rise, and she immediately punches 2. Doors open on 2nd floor. We got off and proceeded around the corner in the direction we thought we should logically go. Everything was lit as normal, but we noticed that there was nothing in the rooms we passed. We saw several doors labeled “operating room—do not enter” and “x-ray room—do not enter.” Being the bold person she is, Megan was opening one “Do not enter” door after another with no results. We came to double doors blocking our progress, opened them and found more hallways leading nowhere. We wandered around in circles for a while, but only encountered more doors, more hallways, more dead ends, and more empty rooms. We were giggling quite hysterically by this time and feeling a bit like we were in a great maze. We finally found another elevator and made haste to ascend to the 3rd floor thinking maybe we could cross over that way. This time there were voices and inhabited rooms, but still not the 3rd floor we were used to. We kept walking down hallways until we stumbled upon the nursing section. We made a dash for the stairs and descended with haste to the 2nd floor. This was now familiar territory. Feeling confident once again, we decided to see if we could access the forsaken part of floor 2 on which we’d been lost. We finally discovered that going into a stairwell presented a door on the other side. We shoved it open and discovered our “operating room” once again, only from the other side. So close, and we couldn’t figure it out! So much for our adventure of the day! We decided that this building must have once been a hospital.
Our second 2.5 hr. class was Assessment which we began in the computer lab. We were instructed on how to access things on Blackboard for assignments, documents, and our eventual exams. We were also given usernames and passwords to access the online segment of our course hosted by the publisher.
During the reading of the policies and procedures portion of the syllabus, the professor read one that made me sit right up and take notice. “Swimsuits, halter-tops, or T-shirts may be worn during lab sessions in which you would need to remove outer clothing in order to practice assessment techniques.” OK! SCAREY THOUGHTS!! This is not going to be a comfortable class for me! We’re going to have to take off our clothes in a class of 30 people—and mixed at that! Now what do I do??? And I thought the uniform was complicated! Oh Lord, how much more am I going to have to endure? And what was that about respecting patients' cultural and religious beliefs? How about student nurses' cultural and religious beliefs--and make that a Mennonite student nurse while you're at it!
After another half hour of lecturing, I emerged from my first day at 6:30 p.m. with eyes glazed over. I was told Sunday at the Student Nurses Picnic that you feel quite overwhelmed for the first half of the semester. I think I’m beyond overwhelmed—I’m petrified! How am I going to manage all this reading and studying on top of working 40 hours? Lord, I’m going to need much bolstering and some extra brain cells.
All the sitting and thinking overwhelming thoughts produced one positive effect. I felt a need for some serious movement (I think I may be running away on the inside). So I went home, changed into comfortable clothing, and hit the Riverwalk. The temperature was quite pleasant as was the scenery, but it was oppressively humid. I didn’t mind at first because I was still a bit chilled from sitting under an air conditioner vent in my last class. But I was soon covered in a sheen of sweat, and by the time I had walked a mile and a quarter, I was beet red and every stitch of my clothing was soaked, and I don’t usually sweat that much.
Now after some sustenance, I must hit the books. And thus begins my first semester as a Nursing Student.
posted by Sara | 10:05 PM
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