QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

People e-mail me questions from time to time so I'm going to post them here with answers little by little.

1. What was your g.p.a before the program?

I have no clue.  I completed my B.A. in English from Hunter College.  I minored in Japanese.  I took all my math and science courses at Brooklyn College then applied.  My grades were kind of all over the place.  Brooklyn College has separate grades for lab and lecture courses.  And has courses split over semesters. I went above and beyond their requirements for the program. Took Chem 2.  Many of my classmates took the non pre-med organic chemistry class. 

2. What was your g.p.a. from Downstate?

I have no idea.  I'm sure somewhere around a B+ range.  I'm not sure what number that corresponds to.  And let me tell you.  Nobody asked on my job interview.  And I will tell you one other thing.  I have classmate who worked as a PCT and continued to do so throughout the program.  And she told us on the last day of school she worked with two graduates of our program.  One with a 3.5 g.p.a and one with 3.1.  She said they both have been at the hospital for over a year each, and to this day, the one with the higher g.p.a. runs around like a chicken with her head cut off, while the student with the lower g.p.a. is the better nurse.  I'm not saying this will be the same for all cases.  But just keep that in mind while your obsessing over your g.p.a.

3. How many hours did you study per day?

Some days none.  Some days 3.5 hours.  My tactic for studying was as follows:

Get the reading list.  Read and outline as much as possible until the point at which I got a blueprint for the examination.  Stop.  Cover all areas I didn't cover yet on the blueprint.  Then go back over the material I already covered.

This landed me in the A- range regularly.  And then I would ignore the ATI completely.  Not study.  Take the ATI exam.  Get like a 50 or 60 which was 10% of your grade.  Take my B+ for the course and that was it.

I told this to the people I was mentoring when they were on their 2nd day of school.  And they rolled their eyes at me.  A couple of months later they understood.  Not to say they did what I did.  Some of them are doing much better.  But they at least understood where I was at.  

Some of you reading this right now also won't understand until you get there in the program.  The skills that land you in the program can kind of work against you once you get in.

MORE TO COME...

The Robert Wood Johnson Scholarship

This was a $10,000 scholarship offered to 10 students in the class who came from populations that were underrepresented in nursing.  
The scholarship was discontinued.  Too bad because they gave you $10,000.  Receiving this scholarship was the single best and worst thing that happened to me when I was in nursing school.  

I'm not going to go into anymore details than that.

VOLUNTEER

If you want to get into this program and you have no prior health care work experience then VOLUNTEERING is the single most important thing you have to do.

It's not difficult.  Just pick a hospital, go to their website, and put volunteer in the search box.

Although I do recommend that you volunteer at the best hospital possible.

Don't be lazy and just choose whatever hospital is closest to your home.  

It's important to be able to sell yourself.  And being able to name drop counts.  Even if only on a subconscious level.  If you say you volunteered at a first rate hospital they will equate you mentally with that hospital.  

For my particular class they chose 60 students out of 700+ applicants.  You need to do whatever you can to stand out.

When I decided to volunteer I put: 10 best hospitals in New York City into Google's search engine.  

If you have to start working your way up from the bottom.  Start from the bottom of the top.  Be at the bottom of the best place that you possibly can.

It's also a great opportunity to see what your future is likely to be like.  People see the dollar signs, but often times don't realize the amount of hard work and dedication required to work as an RN.  Not to mention all the shenanigans.  And people trying to throw you under a bus.  

If you are smart and get good grades, that's great!  But can you work 12 hours straight or more.  And how are you with people?  And do you enjoy the work environment?  Getting in the hospital helps you to figure all that out so you don't end up devoting a lot of time and energy to something that you hate doing in the end and wind up quitting.  

My godmother worked 26 years as an RN.  She retired from North Shore LIJ, Lenox Hill.  When she retired she was making 136,000/year.  And this is what she said to me, she said, "I worked a lot of years and I was getting good pay when I retired.  But you better believe me that they made me work my butt off for every penny of every dollar I earned."