I'm thinking of enrolling in jcu to do a bachelor of nursing (start of 2015) through cairns uni. Can any other mums give any advice on study, placement, hours etc. I have 2 kids who will be 1 and 4 when I start. not sure on full time or part time. Thanks :)
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I'm in my 2nd year of study part time externally thru JCU nursing. External is great with kids, you can study when they're in bed, but the downside is you have to go to Townsville to do your residential skills weeks, but placements can be in and around Cairns. I would hate to be internal, external is much more flexible. Placements are every semester, starting 1 week, then increasing to 2 weeks per semester, then increasing again in 3rd year. The jcu web site has course progression for full time vs part time, so jump on there and have a look, or contact the student centre. Classes on campus can run from 8am through to 8pm, so there's no way I could do that with kids! External is much easier, most of the externals I know have kids.
How often do you have to go down to Townsville for skills week?
How many hours of study,assignments etc do you do in a week?
Also if I chose to do externally, would I be better off just doing the bach nursing and midwifery ? Instead of what I was going to do (Bach of nursing internally then diploma of midwifery externally)
Thanks so much for your reply
Good on you! I'm in my fourth year of uni doing a bachelor of health science. I do mine part time by distance education. Have to be very disciplined and organised, easier said than done but very rewarding :)
Just be weary that nurses are in massive oversupply at the moment. There are literally thousands more nurses in the country than full time contracts. Don't let that stop if you, if it's what you really want to do. Just know it may be very, very hard to secure a full time contract.
Hours are definitely shift work mostly.
Im planning on going on to study midwifery :)