Melissa Hinson
Meet Melissa Hinson
Name: Melissa Hinson
Age: 38
Marital Status: Newly married
Kids: 17-year old son, 13-year old daughter
Strength: Working 12-hour shifts as a single mom
School: University of Michigan
Target: B.S. in Nursing, 2006
Three 12-hour shifts a week in a rural hospital ER tending to car accident victims, dealing with the occasional farm accident, and nursing patients who have suffered a heart attack, would be enough to keep most people busy.
Melissa, an RN who lives in Michigan, is the first to admit it is exhausting. Still she is committed to furthering her career in nursing; and that requires more education.
Her coursework at the University of Michigan, Flint involves extensive reading, writing, and clinicals. It has been a long road for the single mother of two teenagers who will be awarded her bachelor of science in nursing this fall.
But she has done most of it without making the two-hour drive to campus. That is a true blessing to someone who made a lot of personal sacrifices early in her educational career.
To earn her Licensed Practical Nurse certificate in 1996 she had to drive 60 miles each way to St. Clair County Community College. On days when there were clinicals two days in a row, she and another classmate would rent a hotel room and stay over.
"I wanted to go right on for my RN," she remembers. "But I had to take prerequisites." It was three more years before she graduated from the program at St. Clair. She had been able to attend the satellite campus nearby.
"We watched the instructor on television broadcast from the home campus." She only had to drive in for practicals.
With today's highly evolved technology, learning has become more convenient. "Location doesn't matter," she says.
Melissa has taken 'learning from the comfort of one's home' to a new level.
"I got Wi-Fi the minute it was available [and] I have a laptop; so I put my feet up on the couch and work in a recumbent position."
On days when she has three 12-hour shifts back-to-back, she doesn't do a lot of schoolwork. "I check e-mail [and] post on discussion boards for classes."
Students are expected to complete the reading, post comments to a discussion board, read all the responses and reply to two of them.
"I was spending hours and hours on-line," she says. "Now I don't read them all. Sometimes on a thread there'd be hundreds of posts." Melissa had to look for certain economies.
"Find out who thinks like you do and has interesting thoughts—make sure you read them the next time," she recommends. "So you're not wasting your time on those who don't have it together."
Her rule of thumb when considering how to allocate time is to budget three hours per week per credit hour. She says that may be underestimated for nursing classes, though. In electives such as design, philosophy, and English it has been fairly accurate.
"The biggest challenge is balancing time," she says. "It can be difficult not to put off an assignment until the last minute."
With an active 17-year old son and a 13-year old daughter who is a "social butterfly", there are constant demands on her time. Her own social life factors in, too. She has been dating her steady boyfriend for a long time and they recently got engaged, with plans to marry next summer.
The cost is nevertheless daunting. "I refuse to add it up," she quips. When pressed, she estimates that it could be between $12,000 and $14,000 just for her BSN, not including her associate's degree.
"Having a BSN will allow me to pursue career opportunities in nursing available only to those with a BSN or master's degree such as management, teaching, and other upper-level jobs," she says.
She looks forward to graduation more for the sense of completion than the pomp and circumstance. "I want that diploma hanging on my wall," she declares.
She will be very proud to have it read, "University of Michigan." The school's reputation was important to her. She describes the school's credentials, the faculty and graduates as outstanding.
"I wanted my diploma to be recognizable to future employers. I wanted brick and mortar behind it."
