To provide you with the courage to do so, we asked the three students above to share their different paths to nursing school and what made changing careers to nursing worth it for them. The first step is overcoming the fear of making the career switch. At Teesside we had a joint Mental Health Social Work and Nursing degree. People often ask why and the simple answer is that there just aren't enough social work jobs. Not every nurse makes great money. All of the graduates ended up working as either social workers or nurses with most going in to social work because it offered better pay and conditions. As a nurse, you will likely work very different hours. It's not just social work, even though social work is definitely in the lead. Every nurse, healthcare assistant, junior doctor, occupational therapist and social worker I have spoken to says the exact same thing. Allysa Ozzello: More Opportunity. I dunno about getting work in social work without a master's in social work, but if you want to be a nurse, be a nurse. Im a BSW, no license, Im working in a nursing home. It's why people are jumping job to job and everyone wants to switch careers. The key to higher pay in Social Work is for us degreed Social Workers (BSW or MSW), to stop accepting the low pay. Many want to run. Sure, some nurses will need to work overtime, but this is usually by choice. And now after 12 years, I am pursuing a nursing degree. Some literally make 20-25 an hour. Nurses in hospitals tend to work three 12-hour shifts a week while nurses in clinics and other non-hospital settings work five 8-hour shifts a week. I see it at my job every day. State what you need and if the business can't match or at least get in the ballpark, don't accept it. they work while doctors sit behind computers. You wouldn't have to redo all your nursing prereqs in that case, and with a MN you would have an advantage getting work in that field. Nurses get a lot of grief. I have had some pretty interesting jobs in health care from nursing home social worker, hospital social worker-case manager, home health care, hospice, and even health insurance company case manager. There were few jobs, as far as I know which allowed people to continue being jointly registered. Take a look at what people say about nursing.