Mary Said:

Why are there only sales jobs at job fairs?

We Answered:

Because there is high turnover in retail. The jobs pay minimum wage and it's part-time so there are NO benefits = NO medical insurance. And now Obama wants me to pay a fine because I can't afford health insurance. If I can't afford the insurance, HOW will I pay the fine?

People looking for engineering jobs apply directly to engineering firms.
People applying for nursing jobs apply directly to hospitals.

Jobs fairs are not necessary for certain types of jobs.

Daniel Said:

Is nursing for me?

We Answered:

I'm about to graduate with my BSN in May :)

Nurses are not in the spotlight, but we still have a huge responsibility...we are with the patients for 12 hours at a time, and alot can happen in that time. No, we don't prescribe or diagnose, but it's our responsibility to ensure our patients are safe--from medications, to procedures, to monitoring and assessing...it's all our responsibility.

Nursing alot has alot of options. If you don't like clinical nursing (like on a unit in a hospital), you can go into education, management, research, public health, or onto an Nurse Practitioner program. There are also many forms of specialization--pediatrics, emergency care, operating room, ICU, dialysis, gero... the list goes on and on!

Nurse Practitioners, by the way, are very cool. They diagnose medical problems and prescribe medications. They have their own liscence, but they work with a physician to carry out their job. NPs can work in family practice, ER, OR, Peds, gerontology, and anything else you can think of. Incredibly cool.

Yes, nurses do dirty work. But most nurses have patient care assistants (techs) to help them. In the ICU where I'm working as a tech, I'm the one that changes linens, changes diapers, gives baths, and all that. Nurses help me, but I do the "gross" work. Nurses, especially in high acuity settings, focus more on patient assessment than on "cleaning up after a baby". If that was all there was to nursing, it wouldn't take four years of school plus passing the NCLEX to practice.

You won't really be able to get into a master's nursing program without at least a year or two of experience. Most schools set it up this way so that the experience you gain will add meaning to the program and you will learn more. Having been through most of school, I feel this is fair: the way things are taught in school is so different than the way they are done in the real world, that it's important to see real-life what nursing is before you move out of a clinical nurse experience.

Good luck!