Stories

“I was one of the first few nurses in TCTC’s bridge program, and now I am teaching students going through the nursing programs at TCTC.  Before joining the faculty, I was a manager at the hospital here in Houston and the nurses we picked up from Texas County were very prepared. I know a lot of people focus on the fact that it’s a small and local school, but I don’t think they realize that it is a top caliber school. From what I experienced, the nurses that Texas County was putting out were better than some of the nurses these big schools were putting out. Some of the things you hear ‘I want to go to a big college’, really some of those nurses with big four year college degrees couldn’t hold a candle to the nurses from Texas County. Being out in the hiring field, I didn’t know if it was because the class sizes were smaller and instructors can focus on each of the students, but the TCTC nurses had much more preparation and confidence than the bigger school nurses.

TCTC graduates tend to come out much stronger clinically speaking. They were able to work with patients and have that confidence of an experienced nurse.

Now that I am an instructor, I am reminded of the importance of small class sizes. Our class sizes are usually between 20-30 students and there are plenty of instructors for students. As a student, I could always go to instructors to ask for help and talk to them, and now I aim to do the same for my students. I chose TCTC mostly because of the location and the ability to work full time and go to school full time, but once I got here I got to know everybody and they all wanted to see their students succeed because we live in the same town and they want the community to succeed.”