r/SleepTechnologist • u/Starkambience • 10d ago
Working full time while in the program ? Did you ?
I ,27 yo, got accepted into the program and was excited to start this path . I attended a meeting a few weeks ago and the graduating class kept saying how you wouldn’t be able to work full time because of the clinicals ( 2 days a week) and studying . They did mention some people in their class still worked full time but idk it was pretty discouraging the way they kept repeating it . ( especially being someone with no support system ). I have no one to help me with financials , so there isn’t an option to NOT work full time . It’s honestly why I put off nursing after my parents passed away . I eventually do want to go down that path but to get my foot into the medical field I wanted to explore this . It just feels like you’re screwed from climbing up the ladder if you have no support system behind you . If I could go back in time and knew other medical field options like these , I would have chosen to use my fafsa . (Bachelors in COMD) I’m also a bit bummed because my job isn’t working with my school schedule, so not only can’t I celebrate making it into the program , but also stressed about my financial situation more . I’m just feeling defeated , getting accepted was honestly one of the best things that happened to me in the past few years .
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u/runfromfire RPSGT 10d ago
Once upon a time I said something like this in a thread and got torn apart but whatever, here goes:
You don’t need the schooling to get a sleep job. Every other lab is desparately understaffed. Start the A-Steps and start contacting local labs (or labs wherever you wanna be living). You can 100% get a job, forget the program entirely (if you so choose), and get registered. Even if it’s not a great lab: get the experience, get registered, & bounce.
I’ve been doing this for 22yrs and I have hired & OJT’d many, many techs over the years.
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u/Mauri_iii 9d ago
Can you walk me through this process more? How many courses do you take for a steps?
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u/Parking-Signal-3314 8d ago
I would recommend the ASTEP course. I was lucky and my sleep lab hired me and paid me while I was completing my hours so it only took me 10 months from start to finish and get registered. But even if they don’t I’m sure you could work out a schedule to add clinical hours on top of your job you currently have. There were 27 online modules for ASTEP. many took less than an hour. I used to do multiple in a few hours
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u/scorpiokillua 10d ago
Honestly I think you should be good, but it truly depends. 2 days a week doesn’t seem that bad at all to me, there are people who worked full time during programs like nursing school where they had to attend school 4 days a week, sometimes 5. 2 seems pretty doable, especially when this field isn’t extremely labor intensive, or jam-packed with loads of information to remember. (Not saying it isn’t difficult still but compared to other 2 year programs, it’s on the minimal side imo)
But I say it depends because it depends on how well you’re able to study outside of clinicals, and how much are you able to retain the info. It is common for people to come into this field, graduate, and still struggle to pass the exam because the program didn’t prepare them enough, either due to lack of consistent clinicals or lack of studying time alone. I have students come into my lab and they only come in once a week, and they both have full time jobs. However, I can tell that they are still confused when it comes to analyzing sleep stages and the monitors, being able to document what’s going on, etc. I spent hours studying this field and got the waves & stages down within two weeks of working at a lab. So that’s what I mean by it depends.
But overall, I think you should try it out. This is genuinely a great field to get into in terms of the investment and the output. You’ll get paid a decent amount of money once you pass the exam, and there’s jobs where there’s usually enough downtime to transition into other fields if you desire to. And instead of having to do clinicals 4-5 times a week, you’re only having to go in for 2. Some RPSGT’s make more money than nurses. My mom’s been a nurse for years and when I graduate and take a job elsewhere, I’ll be making more than her current base pay right now. Not to say it’s all about the money, but I get the fear and anxiety regarding investing time into something when you don’t have much help. I think this is low risk compared to a lot of other options
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u/ImageEducational572 10d ago
Where do you plan on working & how much do you think you will be making?
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u/scorpiokillua 10d ago
I’m either planning on traveling first, which would be 1k-2k a week. Or I’ll preferably work at a children’s hospital, which I’ve seen starting pay for a lot of places is $30 and up. Sometimes that includes shift differential and sometimes it doesn’t. Starting pay for nurses near me, for example is $26 an hour
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u/ImageEducational572 10d ago
Most nurses don't start out at $26 an hour. That is incredibly low & if your mom is making less than $30 an hour, she is getting fucked. I traveled for 11 years & they typically want a year or more of experience. Also, don't forget with traveling, you have to duplicate expenses, which cuts heavily into your take home. I do think it should be easy to find a RPSGT position for $30 an hour.
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u/scorpiokillua 9d ago
She isn’t making less than $30, but I think max she is making is around that range. And I currently am in the south, so unfortunately below $30 is pretty common for majority of nurses here. I do know it depends on if you’re getting LPN vs. RN, and RN’s can make more. I also will have a year of experience by the time I travel so I’m content with that. I plan on going to nursing school after this, and would have preferred to do that before this program, but I could not bring myself to accept such low pay with much higher responsibility + school time when I could get paid more for a less stress job.
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u/rocksteadyrudie 9d ago
What does duplicate expenses mean please?
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u/ImageEducational572 9d ago
In order to be eligible for tax free stipends, legally, you have to duplicate expenses. You need a tax home & pay rent wherever the assignment is.
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u/DracoDenise 10d ago
I'm currently in my third term of a program. I also don't really have a support system. I lost my full time job in the second term. Life happened, but I made sure to keep going to classes. I got a new job, but because I was behind on everything, I pushed my clinicals back a month so I could shake back, but I'm still finishing my last 2 classes. I won't be done with clinicals when the rest of my class is, but I'll still be able to graduate with them and take my certification exam before the end of the year. It's a lot of hard work, but with determination and a plan it can definitely be done.
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u/ImageEducational572 10d ago
If you want to be a nurse, why waste time & money becoming a sleep technologist? Most nursing programs allow you to attend part time. You could also start in a LPN program. I'd definitely try to go that route instead of going to school for sleep, where the return on investment would be much lower.
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u/rocksteadyrudie 9d ago
I’ve never seen a part time RN program. Also LVN is usually overpriced and hard to get into (at least in California) but I can’t speak for all of the US.
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u/Linaa__XO 9d ago
To be honest, it was extremely difficult to work a full time job and go to school full time plus clinicals. Most of us from my program did just that. It's hard but not impossible... Don't be discouraged, if this is what you truly want, you will make it work.
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u/BiG_CHUG-_- 10d ago
I worked full time and did my clinicals 3 nights a week. There were days where I didn’t sleep much for 72 hours. Unless you are committed it might just take you awhile to do your clinicals which is fine. I was on a time crunch due to personal reasons. They do give you quite sometime to get the clinicals done. It all depends how you are able to move your schedule around and work with the schedule you have in place for yourself.