Calling out to nurses and student nurses

[Livinglifepeachy]

Hey

I am due to start a nursing degree end of this month but I can't stop feeling like nurses are being taken for a mug and cheap labourers to put it bluntly. Here are the reasons why...

We have to pay over 9k per year in tuition fees and we don't get to choose our placements at the NHS. We don't get paid to be on placement yet apprentices do. Our placement equals to 2700hrs in three years. From what I have heard from second year nurses and third year nurses is that whilst your on placement your mentor usually doesn't have a lot of time for you. We can't actually hold a non flexible jobs because placements can be any day of the week so only when you are not on placement you can achieve to work weekends.

Can someone please share your thoughts on this matter are my feelings justifiable or is there something I have missed?

And as I said, we did a lot more in the previous weeks and they count the hours over all. Not by each week.
I do a tonne of home learning, getting good grades does not come east for me that’s for sure enough sure.

OP I kinda meant what a normal week looks like.

I will try and find you our Feb 18 first years.

Thank you IamGru! Glad to hear it’s worth it, I remember finishing my last degree and thinking ‘I’m NEVER doing that again.’ And yet here I am. And nursing is even more full on, I’ve no doubt you are more than happy for it to be nearly over.

I am so excited to start nursing I know its hard work but fingers crossed three years from now I will have a vocation rather than just a job. Thanks vent

You will love it. Are you doing adult or child?

@JustVent I'm in the midst of dissertation and placement so I'm just very tired. But I am glad Acute care is over!

I've opted to do adult going to be intense and a lot of hard work but I will make it through. I hope the government ré introduces some sort of scheme or part pay tuition for nurses.

I cannot wait to leave nursing.As soon as I can I will....it is all from start to finish and beyond a total disorganised farce.

IamGru the dissertation is a killer. It was my blood sweat and tears last time.
Have you got a job lined up? Are you adult or child?

livinglife I hope so too.

Soooooo much posturing here. We are all student nurses and no one is better or has it easier than another. We should be building each other up.

I spent 48 actual hours doing reading for 1 half day class. I have 2 six week placements left to do. Of 2nd Year with 2 exams and yes we are told we can be called into uni at any point they seem fit.

22.5 hours of readings isn't enough.

I work too and I'm exhausted. Have a toddler and my husband is an HCA. so I'm often reading at stupid o'clock in the morning.

My placements have been hit and miss. But you only need to be with your mentor 40% of the time. So as well as 40% of time with mentor, I also follow any nurse who will have me and the HCA. I learn so much from HCA. They know their ward inside out.

Next up I have 2 community posts and I'm worried that I won't have the ward time as I thrive in an acute environment.

I find Male students do have a wider experience than the females of our cohort. In adult field Male Nurses aren't in big numbers. In mental health though they are in much higher numbers.

I'm a mature student. Sometimes I find I'm not as well received as the younger students. I'm grilled harder and expected to know more.

I wasn’t trying to say I was better, nor that have it easier. I am going to dispell BS such as not being ‘allowed’ to go on holiday during AL or being unable to work...

Work wise I stated quite a few posts back has to be flexible enough to allow placements. Bank hca is the perfect job but very hard to get in.

Am getting really annoyed at being accused of bs here. I am repeating what dd told me. Students have a interpreted it as you can't book a holiday during the summer break in case you are called back. I know we havent booked a family holiday as a result but i did think if all is okay we could get a last minute week away. Maybe that changes in the second year or maybe different uni's do different things.
She has more than 1 mentor. 2 really good, 1 who seems more reluctant. I think (and maybe wrong here) that you have to do some mentoring to move up a grade.

It's not about being unable to work, providing a student can get a job to accommodate. It's about having a job during AL becoming essential for many students in lieu of the bursary. That time (for many, not all) is no longer holiday time, unfortunately. That's not made up.

And you said yourself stargazer the information is third hand. I’m not saying you’re lying. I’m just saying it’s not true. If lecturers are so sure that all their students will fail their assignments and exams thus having to resit during AL then it must be a horrendously shit university. Plus, a lecturer can’t tell tell students when they can or cannot go on holiday....

OP I’m not an HCA, it isnt the only job to use bank staff.

Lifeispeachy, stargazer said all of her daughters peers were unable to work. That’s what I’ve challenged....

Stargazer, I can fully believe this.
I've come across many course and module leaders who seem to think the nursing programme was the be-all and end-all and, as such, life (irrespective of other commitments) revolved around it.

FWIW stargazer you’re daighter is very lucky to have you and not need to work.

THere will be people on her course that will have to work if they want to feed their children....

I trained with a bursery. I wouldn't do it again now - not with the debt at the end of it.

Lifeisabeach a lecturer advises and teaches, they aren’t probabtion officers. They CANNOT tell you not to go on holiday.

They just can’t!

stargazer2030, unis tend to start students off on the stance of telling them to literally make no plans for 3 years. They do this to cover their backs as their year plans change and it's not a rarity. I had a holiday booked at the end of my first year and the year plan got changed literally 6 weeks before it... I was no longer going to miss 2 days if theory and catch up with any online materials and was instead going to have to take my flexible annual leave week. I'd probably have had to take sick leave or take an unauthorised absence if I'd already used my leave.

I accept that I need to be flexible and take the hit if this happens, because uni do tell us not to hook any holidays. It's still extremely frustrating. Because realistically there is time to take a holiday. But with how changeable nursing programmes are, there'd be every chance that their year plan changed before she goes. Once she's settled in, she should know what she can get away with. If, like me, she barely ever takes a day off, nobody is going to say anything if they change the tear plan and she ends up needing to take a week or two of leave.

JustVent, lecturers can say what they like as long as it's not discriminatory. What the student does with what they are told is a different matter.
I can well imagine a module lead telling a student not to book a holiday during AL, especially if said student/cohort grades aren't great.

I work for a small charity who hosts students on diversity placements (ie out of hospital). We employ suitable nursing students on our relief bank and it works really well for both sides, so don't discount finding work during your study!

Ignore the appalling spelling fails

Lifeisabeach it would down like a lead balloon if lecturers were saying “You cannot book holidays during AL because you may need to do resists.”

As I said, if anything is a huge reflection on them as a shite lecturer if they are so convinced their students will need to resist... not to mention the fact they are giving false information!

Stargazer when I was a student nurse in 2006-2009 the uni said exactly that to us. No holidays in summer in case of resits/hour make up. No one listened of course