If you are a registered nurse (RN), then you already know that a master’s degree in nursing sciences can only be good for your career. However, that is much easier said than done. There are tuition fees to consider, and you may need to take a break from work, or at least work part-time. Then there is the question of routine because it can be difficult to go back to school after working for a significant amount of time.
Some nurses have families with children to take care of as well, and to them, going back to nursing school can potentially seem like an impossibility in light of everything. However, there are ways to get past most of these obstacles and become a higher paid, more qualified nursing professional. It’s never going to be easy of course, but the real question is whether you can consider getting an MSN degree to be something that’s worth the effort necessary. Let’s look at some of the reasons why it might really be worth it.
Managing Everything: Is It Possible?
If you are already working as a registered nurse, then enroll yourself in an accredited online MSN degree course. It just solves so many of the problems that keep RNs from completing their graduation. Accredited online MSN courses are designed flexibly for professional nurses, which means that you will have time to hold down a job and support your own education. Since you will not need to take a break from work, you will also be gaining experience and a higher qualification at the same time.
Higher Pay, But by How Much?
How much of a pay boost you will receive after completing your graduation in nursing depends on several factors such as:
- Specialization
- Job role
- Employer
- State
- Location
- Experience
- Record
- However, we can still make an estimate from the data that’s available. To make things simple, let’s compare salaries of different advanced practice nurses on a nationwide average scale with the national average salary of an undergraduate RN.
- Undergraduate Registered Nurse (RN) – Approximately $71,000 per year.
- Family Nurse Practitioner (MSN – FNP) – Approximately $101,500 per year.
- Pediatric Nurse Practitioner (MSN – PNP) – Approximately $99,000 per year.
- RNs can potentially receive a salary boost of 40% or more after completing their MSN, as we can see from the above comparison. This should prove to be a lucrative enough incentive, especially when you consider the future prospects of assuming leadership roles that an MSN might open up.
- Higher Pay without the Specialist Job Role?
- It should be noted that you can only expect a hike as big as stated above if you can also find a job that suits your new qualification. There is a growing demand for advanced practice nurses, so that should not be too difficult. Estimates also point towards an exponentially growing employment rate up top for nurses, with each new year.
- What if you don’t manage to become a nurse practitioner right away? Will you still be working for the same money, despite all the effort and expenses? Not quite, because you can still expect a significant boost in your salary as a senior nurse with higher qualifications. According to the BLS, the average salary of a RN – MSN is $89,000 per year, which is 25% higher than the average salary of the undergraduate RN.
- At the end of the day, it all comes down to you and your present circumstances. Now that you have some of the more important facts though, making an informed decision should be easier.