How to Make It Through Nursing School

What gave me the edge that I needed to succeed in nursing school?

I have been working as a nurse quite a while now but things have not changed all that much. The required training courses are still very demanding and very time consuming, they leave many bright students at their wits end.

When I was going to nursing school, the one tool that I found invaluable was a skill that my parents had insisted that all their children acquire. That skill was speed-reading. There were many fellow students who were blown away by the sheer volume that we needed to read nightly. They were lost, so far behind, by the end of the first semester that they had to drop out or 'flunk out'. Than there were those who required very little sleep, they read though the night and had no time for anything else.

I, on the other hand, did my speed-reading than went to sleep. I went to my social club meetings every Tuesday evening, my ski weekends and beach weekends with little interruption. I maintained a relatively normal social life during my nursing school years in spite of the grueling study regime. In spite of my lack of sacrifice I managed to maintain an A- average and my sanity remained in tact. As a matter of fact during nursing school, in my second semester, I met my future husband during a Forth of July beach weekend at the Jersey Shore, I was married to him with in a year of graduating nursing school.

There are definitely a few necessary qualities you will need to bring to nursing school. Among them are dedication, fierce attention to detail and an interest in science. If you have trouble concentrating when someone is talking, forget nursing as a career. You need to be able to sit through and absorb large amounts of material during lecture classes. A tape recorder helps if you can not absorb the information with the first "listening." You need to want it, you need to find the science interesting and you need to be willing to take what is offered in class and soak it up like a sponge. You need to be able to take not just good, but great class notes.

I passed my state boards with plenty of breathing room and never looked back. I have since gone on to further my studies and I still rely on the tried and true way, with speed-reading. My annually required CEUs (Continuing Education Credits, required to maintain my nursing license.) are a breeze with speed-reading under my belt. Literature that I encounter at work is devoured quickly and remembered when I need it.

The next time you see an advertisement on the TV or hear one on the radio for a speed-reading class, pay attention. Get the phone number and find a class near where you live, sign up for the course. It can make you or break you in nursing school. It is a sanity saver in other educational situations too.

If you enjoy people and nursing is the career path you choose, I know you will find it rewarding and continuously interesting. Good luck to you and study hard, it's worth it.

Nursing is a career, nay a calling, like no other.