A New LVN's Account of the Pursuit of Nursing Career
By Jules (An LVN Fresh Grad)
I graduated from LVN school early last year in 2010, passed NCLEX, and am licensed since fall. I have learned a great deal about the current state of the job market for nursing industry, particularly for the LVN's. The picture is not what I expected when I enrolled in a VN program, encouraged by those I came in contact with that I was making a good choice. I am not at all second guessing my decision to become a nurse, but the path I have chosen in becoming one would have been different if I had known what I have come to learn the hard way through my endless job search efforts the last few months. Not only is the picture very different, it isn't pretty at all.
First, I had the impression that there were not enough nurses to fill the positions that were needed. There were and still are aggressive campaigns by vocational schools claiming this to be the case. This is not true, so were they lying just to get business? In this economy, when any job is scarce, information eluding that there is a demand is a very big deal, and would naturally attract attention. I have come to understand, that it was not a total “lie,” but instead a truth from a past not too long ago that changed drastically recently, which not too many people have yet caught on to. The general public and these schools were not the only ones claiming how more nurses are needed, but even many in the healthcare industry have the same idea. I spoke to friends who are physicians, as well as retired nurses, and they all told me the same thing.
I now know that in fact that there were shortages of nurses, but that trend has come and was long gone. The shortage was said to be so severe, that employers were giving out incredible incentives in order to hire new nurses, from cash bonuses, high salaries, to paying for your education to become nurses in exchange for the commitment of employment. This applied not only to the private sector, but to city, state, and even on the federal level such as the military. However, on all levels, this is no longer the case.
Let me provide a little more information about myself, at least that which pertains to this situation in my job search. I was top of class throughout VN School, started immediately as class rep, and soon became and stayed as class president until I graduated. I was awarded Highest Academic Achievement award as well as Leadership Award. I have background in business, as well as experience in teaching, which included mathematics. I speak 3 languages. I went to USC, during which I was among the top 2-3% of student body to be in the honor's list for writing. I do not share all this to boast, but only to make a point that I am a pretty good applicant as I seek employment as a nurse, yet none of it really mattered since the market is frozen!
As soon as I was licensed, I started applying everywhere. Most require you to create an online profile, and submit application electronically. They invite you to search through their posted open positions on their website and if interested, follow instruction to file an application. This process gave me the first real picture of what was truly going on. There were hardly any posting for LVN's! Wait, how can this be? Weren't there supposed to be abundance of openings since there weren't enough candidates? I went through the list of hospitals, from my first choice to my last, until I was looking at hospitals outside of my list that included locations that were far outside the area I thought I wouldn't need to consider initially. I quickly found out that there were no chance for new LVN's at any acute facility. So I started looking at sub-acute facilities. The situation was the same. Long term care facilities and home health agencies were pretty much the only places that actually had some opening for LVN's, but very scarcely. At least the military? After all with so much unrest in the world where the soldiers are deployed, there are actual life risks. I heard all educational cost, past and future will be covered. Why not? I wanted to become a nurse to help people. If I live through it, I will have so much experience I could apply anywhere I want. Unbelievably, the situation with the military was similar. They had more than enough nurses. There are some RN openings. That ended that conversation.
At this point, probably due my stubborn nature, I was not ready to accept that what I was led to believe was so inaccurate. I decided to go back to my friends who were in the medical field, to see if they could get me in. Former nurses, including my nursing school instructors, gave me names of facilities to try, but to no avail. No openings. Doctors who worked at big hospitals and were ready to be referrers could not help, when there weren't any LVN positions to start with. If there were, they all required experience. After a couple of months, I knew I had to change my approach drastically. I was beginning to see the real picture.
Someone suggested that going for positions that you are overqualified for is an option. This would mean nursing assistant, or CNA positions. The idea bothered me a great deal, especially after spending enormous amount of money going to VN School, but I made myself open to it, in exchange for at least getting into the type of first rate hospitals I wanted to work for. I figured I will have a better chance of finding better opportunities later if I was already in the system. At least I was able to find open positions posted for CNA's. I applied to many of them at all the hospitals on my list, and waited hopefully.
Weeks went by, and I did not hear from any of them, except from UCLA. They straight out rejected me! I called the human resources department only to find out that it is against their policy to hire anyone with a “higher” license. They told me that they have encountered problems in the gray area dealing with the legal scope of practice. Indeed the scope of practice is different between CNA and LVN, and between LVN and RN, for that matter. They told me that if someone is hired as a CNA, but has LVN license, there are gray areas in situations where, for the benefit of the patient, LVN action was called for in the immediate moment, but he/she only took CNA action since that was what they were hired for, and liability problem could arise.
I started wondering if that was the case for all the other hospitals I applied for, and contacted them. They did not have the same rules, but I found out another surprising qualification issue that was keeping me from getting hired as a CNA. Clearly I am overqualified being a LVN. As a student nurse during school, we learned and performed CNA tasks at clinical sites, as well as delegated some tasks and learn to actually lead the CNA's at these facilities. Moreover, as a LVN, I am capable of assessing the patients' condition more accurately and in depth than any CNA could, which makes the patient cared for much safer to be cared for by me than a CNA. However, the employers consider a CNA with experience to be more qualified than a LVN. This experience had to be CNA experience, so new LVN's or LVN's with LVN experience were in the same position. LVN's had a slight edge when competing with CNA's without experience. I was told I am in the “maybe” pile. Incredible. There are many CNA applicants as there were openings, and that was why I haven't been able to get a CNA job yet. Although this is still a possibility, I was shocked to find out this harsh situation. It is almost laughable that I spent incredible amount of energy and time thinking if I even wanted to go this route, thinking this will be a given, but just have to “settle” for.
Very discouraged and unhappy, I knew that once again, I had to go another route. What are some of my other fellow former VN classmates doing? I found out that most were still unemployed, but some were in home healthcare nursing. I applied to a few home healthcare agencies, and still waiting to find out if I would get in. They too, either required or highly preferred experience. How some of my fellow former classmates did landed the job? They had people they knew, who were nice enough to stretch the truth and refer them as having experience, when that experience might have just been care taking or CNA work. Others are working officially as caretaker/CNA for home health agencies, which may be the next thing I might have to consider. The situation is grave. I am no longer disillusioned.
As I was planning to continue on to RN program anyway, it appears that it is the best course of action at the moment to focus on, in my pursuit to become a working nurse. I was planning to work as a LVN through RN school, which was the reason I did not go directly to the RN route to start with. Considering that it would take a lot longer to complete the RN program, not just due to the actual length of the program but especially taking into consideration the wait listing for schools and/or required classes, it made sense to go the LVN route which was available immediately, and then bridge to private/vocational RN programs, even though this would be a LOT more costly. Personally I have financial demands. Economy was horrible. No jobs were easy to come by. I needed work. Granted LVN jobs were abundant, going through the VN program and become qualified to apply to those positions ASAP was a sound course of action. Spend money to make money – not a bad route. However, if I had known LVN jobs were so difficult to come by, I would have gone the direct RN route with a long term plan and looked for other work that would accommodate that choice. It really hurts when I justified spending more money (in my case, getting heavy in debt) based on the false fact that there will be jobs waiting for me. Only if I knew what I know now... I am sharing my story in hopes that it will help others who might have the same misconception or misinformation I had when I started out in my nursing career path. Perhaps it may help save time and/or money by making the soundest decision based on the true current state of the job market.
