No, you may NOT do your placement there...

[LadyofArc]

So we have a few rules with students in our courses for field placements:

- Wherever you are allocated is where you go. No swapsies unless there's a reason beyond our control (eg the facility is in quarantine) or the situation warrants a swap (eg student is pregnant, escaping a DV situation or similar).

- You CANNOT do your placement at your place of employment.

- You cannot do your placement at a place where you have a conflict of interest (provided it's actually disclosed to us - examples of this would be that their partner/relative/child works at the facility or relative is a patient at the facility)

With all this in mind, we have a student out on field placement at the moment who is NOT happy with their choice of place (and she knew she was going there I might add). The reasons why? She had gotten a job with a private hospital (pending completion of this course) and wanted to go there instead of where she actually ended up (aged care). So far, she has done the following while on her field placement:

- Demanded to see our insurance arrangements. (not sure why )

- Demanded to see our contract with the facility we sent her to. (In this case, the facility is part of a larger chain and the contract is with THEM. Also, no.)

- Got pissy because I didn't give her a heads up that she was getting a mentor visit that day (that one was my fault, I usually give the students a heads up if I can) and took it out on one of the coordinators.

- Did nothing but whine and complain the entire time she was on-campus about the arrangements, to the point where we had to warn one of the lecturers (who worked there) about her!

Unfortunately for her, the mentor I gave her does NOT take shit from anyone, least of all students . This is going to be very interesting...

[earl colby pottinger]

Gee

And yet she can't see if she causes so much trouble that she does not pass the placement she also will not get the job she already is planning on getting?

[Buzzard]

Ugh. Another one that can't figure out the simple 'shut up, do your time, get out' schedule. She's there to learn and broaden her horizons... or at least that's what the system is setup for.

[csquared]

I suppose that it would be out of line to contact here future place of employment and warn them about her behavior.

[Nunavut Pants]

I suppose that it would be out of line to contact here future place of employment and warn them about her behavior.

It probably would be. But it sure is fun to imagine it!!!

(Can we send her over there via pneumatic clown cannon???)

[Pixelated]

I pity whoever actually ends up hiring her ... management and staff alike.

[LadyofArc]

Oh it gets BETTER.

So, it turns out that there's a few other things I found out today:

- The company who owns the hospital she's due to be employed at we DO have a contract with, but they don't take our students for some reason.

- She emailed us today to say that she needed to take tomorrow off to buy "proper shoes." (We do allow you to take some days off for sick leave without needing to make them up. This is NOT an acceptable excuse) She a) had five weeks to buy proper shoes, b) somehow managed to bypass every single check we do on-campus for uniform and c) was unaware that the department stores in her area (eg Kmart) are open late every night). When we all got that email, our reactions were basically: (the last two from me)
At least she didn't email the person who schedules the students to placements with pictures of shoes on a table...

- Her future place of employment? Turns out it's her current place of employment as well - she works there part-time in a different role. So, even if we wanted to send her there, it wasn't going to happen.

[earl colby pottinger]

Whine

So what happens when she whines and complains about where she will be sent?

[LadyofArc]

So what happens when she whines and complains about where she will be sent?

I'm assuming you mean the department in the hospital. I honestly have no idea.

Wee bit of an update - she was assessed last week by the mentor who takes no shit from anyone. End result: she failed. She was also placed on an at-risk contract, meaning that she has 3 weeks to get her act together or she fails.

When she got the feedback, she promptly proceeded to call us and bitch to one of the head lecturers about the "real" side of the story. Said lecturer knew exactly what was going on however and proceeded to point out how we were doing everything right.

[LadyofArc]

And more of an update!

Whiney Student nearly got herself kicked out of the course the other day. It was only through the sheer fact that we thoroughly investigated the issue that she was able to continue for now, but she was SO damn close to getting canned.

The incident in question was that she wound up giving a resident medication without being supervised by a qualified staff member (This is a rule we have in place regardless of where you go and is for legal and safety reasons - there are also certain controlled substances they cannot give regardless) and said staff member did not countersign it either. Further investigation revealed that another mentor (who was NOT hired by us, but from another provider) had told the student they were allowed to do so and since Whiney Student has already got one hell of an ego and attitude, they figured they could get away with it.

Needless to say, the student got another "at risk" contract smacked on her AND was placed on what I like to think of as a "red flag" warning - the "red flag" basically says that they are really close to failing overall.

[jedimaster91]

She doesn't sound like someone I would want taking care of me. Or my worst enemy for that matter.

[LadyofArc]

She doesn't sound like someone I would want taking care of me. Or my worst enemy for that matter.

It gets better - her aim is to get into management. Her mindset (aside from being irritated about doing an aged care placement) is "I just need to do enough to pass, then I'll go into management." (She's also studying a postgraduate course in management)

Sadly however, the placement has been cut short due to a death in the family.

If a student is going to be away for a few weeks due to a family emergency or if we had to cut the placement short due to the facility stuffing us around (both of which have happened), the procedure is to typically offer them "however many days they have left to complete + 1 week," either at the same facility or another one nearby, so as she only had this week left (and was due to have her final assessment later in the week), she's getting two weeks when she returns - and those two weeks will be right back in the same place

[Dragon_Dreamer]

Any updates?

[LadyofArc]

Any updates?

Not really - I was away while her final placement happened, but she managed to pass. We have had a few cases where the student looks as though they're about to fail, but then turn things around in the final week.

This is in a huge contrast to ANOTHER student who managed to get herself removed from two placements we set up for her because she has this massive laundry list of complaints and is otherwise rude to the facility staff. >_>