Jobs Are Really Tough for Newly Nursing Grads

In the 2½ years of operation, nursing students at Mesa State College adapted the chant, Not only would they immediately find work, they’d be able to pick out their dream jobs. Marni Flores finished her BS Nursing in December. She and few of her colleagues find it really tough to find job locally in the past two months. At present, many nurses who were working abroad have settled here in the Philippines because the need of nurses abroad is no longer in-demand. This is a bad news for the newly grads. Based from the web site of St. Mary’s Hospital, they are only hiring nurses with a minimum of 2 years work experience. In the 3 previous months, there are 15 to 20 job openings for nursing graduates.

According to Flores, before there are recruiters from hospitals located in Delta, Montrose and Rangely who are encourage nursing students, but now they prefer newly grads. In Fruita, there’s a new 15-bed Family Health West hospital which is planned to open in July. The extension of St. Mary’s Hospital will be opened by 2010. These will lead to potential jobs for nursing grads. Flores has once offered a position as supervisor of a retail shop. One of her colleague started working in a bank since December while others have practiced their nursing profession in another place. Luckily, Flores grabbed a 6-month job with full time pay at Community Hospital. But when she finished the training, her type of job turned down to on-call/part-time work with no benefits and vacation period. She said that if she and her husband don’t have kids, they will just move to another place. [via]