No More Jobless RNs

USA Today got a report from Vanderbilt University 2009 analysis. The report forecasted that U.S. will need 260,000 nurses in 2025. According to LA Daily News, by 2020 above six million Californians will be 65 years old. Based from the recent average age of registered nurses at 40, California expects 10,000 RN graduates per year to solve the shortage.

We heard of the huge shortage of nurses nowadays but in reality there are jobless RNs. Courtney Hansen, a 27-year-old graduate from Moorpark College, stated, When we all started nursing school, we thought, We're going to get sign-on bonuses and a job right away'. Now that we've graduated, we get responses back from hospitals that say we're not taking new graduates. To give solution to this shortage, nursing schools began to increase their class population.

According to USA Today, Arizona had 2,805 graduates in 2009. Experienced nurses postponed their retirement and the new entries to the profession are increasing.

LA Daily News stated that in the 1990s hospitals radically cut back to cope with rising health care costs and shorter patient stays so many RNs lost their jobs. According to Deloras Jones, the Executive Director of the California Institute for Nursing & Healthcare, hospitals and health systems are cutting the employment of new graduates so new grads are having a hard time finding jobs.

But Mike Dacumos, a 2009 nursing grad, defended to Glendale News-Press that many of his old classmates are jobless because prospective employers do not have subsidy for new grads. However, Rosanne Curtis, Dean of the Nursing Department at Mount St. Mary's College, said that there are places in the country that are hiring nurses. Newly grads must be flexible about location and shifts. Janet Allan, Dean of the University of Maryland nursing school, defended their students are getting jobs. Jennifer Castaldo, assistant chief nursing officer for Valley Presbyterian Hospital in Van Nuys, recommends that students can look for hospitals that will offer scholarships or internships if they don't want to be relocated.

New grads can also work with federally funded programs such as Verdugo Workforce Investment Board in Los Angeles, CA. Glendale News-Press, discussed that Verdugo Workforce Investment Board in Los Angeles, CA pays half of the cost for hospitals to train new nurses for 12-16 weeks. For instance, Armine Khudanyan graduated from Cal State Los Angeles in 2009. With the help of Verdugo, she was able to land a job at Glendale Memorial Hospital. [via citytowninfo.com]