Let me just tell you..there are at least 100 ABSN programs in the country. And while that may not seem like a lot and when compared to the number of nursing programs in general there are....you are right...not very many. But when you have 100 choices of what to do with your future....it is pretty overwhelming.
But its me...so I made a list. I ended up with about 60 schools...mostly based on places I wanted to live. AKA..schools on the east coast....in Missouri, Utah, California or Alabama...in a big city...or some place warm. The southwest, most of the Midwest, Texas and anything north and west of Missouri were out of the running. From this list...I again whittled it down to about 14ish....this was done again pretty indiscriminately mostly focusing on location again. Closeness to home and/or family as well as proximity to a beach also played a pretty big role in this process.
From the list of about 14, I made a spreadsheet. There were columns for institute size, start times, lengths, prerequisites needed, costs, distance from home/family and then overall pros and cons. This was one INTENSE spreadsheet. I spent hours collecting information. At this point I became an octopus...on the other hand, on the other hand, on the other hand....till I had at least 10 hands (guess that makes me a squid??)
After a great deal of weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth (I actually had no idea it would only get worse!) I chose 5 schools. University of Missouri (Mizzou), University of Utah (the U), Johns Hopkins (JHSON), Massachusetts General Hospital Insititue of Health Professions (MGH) and Goldfarb School of Nursing (GF).
Each had pros and cons. JHSON was my DREAM! MGH would be awesome cause I would live in Boston. GF is in St Louis so I would get to be in the BEST place on earth with the BEST people on earth. The U would mean I got to stay in Utah with some pretty awesome people. Then there was Mizzou---I needed a 2.9 GPA to get in....basically and honestly it was on the list only in case everyone else said no.
So I applied. SERIOUSLY ANNOYING PROCESS!!!!!! None of the schools had the same requirements for essays or recommendations or even deadlines! Juggling it all was difficult. Recommendations are really hard to get let me just say. It means sucking up and awkwardly asking people to write nice things about you...not cool. And essays are hard to write and I had to write in a different way for each school. Again sucking up. Lets be honest...the application process is just a long series of sucking up!
Anyway so I got all the applications in. Except for the U. That one had the latest date. And for some reason I wasn't feeling it. In the end I decided to not apply because I just didn't think it was where I should be. Although I am slightly regretting that decision as my time to leave Provo is drawing near.....I'm not wanting to LEAVE! But anyway...Everything was in and I was just waiting for the letters......now comes the WORST part :)
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