Tomorrow

Well here it begins.  Tomorrow I start what will likely be the beginning of finally joining the world as a contributing member of society.  After the next 8 weeks I'll be taking my first certification test as a Nurse Assistant, or Patient Care Tech.  I'm extremely excited about this prospect.  For the past nearly 9 years I've been working every odd job I can find just to make ends meet, and haven't been succeeding.  Last May I finally achieved an associates degree and started applying to 4 year colleges.  Sadly none of them accepted me.  So I had to look at a backup plan.  It was around this time that I realized finally what I wanted to do with my life.  I was going to start applying to local community colleges to become an RN.

A couple weeks later, I was in summer classes, and began applying to various schools.  One of the classes was a two parter, for a certification as a CNA.  These are the people that take temperatures, blood pressure, check on patients along with all the less known jobs like bedbaths and perineal care.  It's a real job, it's as often as I can schedule for, and it gets me the experience I need in a health care setting, all of which I'm looking forward to.

So tomorrow morning, I start.  I'm seriously giddy as can be.  Just 8 weeks of intense final training, with clinical hours on Saturday mornings, and I can finally get a real job.  But that's not even the best part.

As it turns out, even a community college nursing program is quite competitive, but in a different way than normal transfers to universities.  As it turns out, as long as you've passed the prerequisite classes(which I've done quite efficiently) it's more of a matter of comparing your prereq gpa and your scores on standardized exams (HESI A2, or the TEAS) determines your placement or lack therof.  Well I searched around, and am in the process of attempting to enter two programs around here, and fulfilling the requirements for one other.

At Prairie State, I have applied, and am waiting for the end of fall term to find out if I've been accepted.  At Moraine Valley, I have an informational meeting on Sept 28th to get my TEAS test card, and find out if I can get in there.  But the third seems the most promising.  It's a conglomeration of 9 community colleges in the greater Phoenix area.  From my understanding, as long as you meet the prereqs, you are placed in line, and will eventually get in.  I'm hoping to get in on this program.  While I'm waiting for an open spot, I can work full time, and hopefully finally achieve my goal of moving out, and living on my own.  It's been a few years too long, in regards to that.

So, I start the plan in the morning, and the fingers stay crossed.