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Nursing Schools are challenging, and with the nature of a nursing career and Medical Training, it is truly a trial by fire. I am enrolled in a nursing program and will graduate the LVN program in August 2007. I attend evening and weekend classes to work around my current job. Going to school and working is tiring, but sometimes magical! It would definitely be easier if you could attend school full-time and not work. However it's not impossible to survive, you just have to forget about a life for up to 2 years.

To work in the medical field, you need a real experience since no Medical Training is complete if it misses the possibility of interacting with actual patients. I found out - both observing my learning curve and looking at my students, that regardless how literate you are, clinical practice is required to be a good nurse. The dummies we use to simulate procedures such as injections, insertion of NG tubes, catheters and tests neither can give you the sense of a real body nor give you good or bad feedback, depending on which procedure is concerned.

It's crucial and very much recommended for you to gather and analyze a list of Nursing Schools that you are interested in enrolling, as well as narrowing down fields of nursing you are considering. Make a note of your priorities and what you would like to accomplish. Will being a LVN be sufficient for what you're looking for? Are there other careers in nursing that you would do better in?

You have to verify if the private Nursing Schools have the accreditation you need if you want to branch into other Nursing Careers later down the road. Does that program give you an AA or BS? Does it give you a state-specific license only? What credits can be transferred to a community college or to a university if you choose to go onto a Bachelor's or Master's degree?

Another thing to think about is how much you'll have to spend! Private Nursing Schools have broader acceptance levels, but the tuition is a great deal more than community college. I had to take the private school option as my local community college had a waiting list for the RN program that stretched out to 2011! I had to pay their higher fees to get my schooling within a sensible time frame.

There's one more consideration I am suggesting: experience the tours and even stay in a class or two. Speak to the staff and teachers. Observe which kind of students the school attracts. You will have to stay with these people for as long as two years so it's important to know exactly what to expect. You may or may not like it. Also find out if you like the teaching method. Is it sufficiently challenging? Too much? Do you like your teachers? And what about the staff. All of this will have a large impact on your level of satisfaction.