The Gritty Nurse

Nursing students in Canada and the U.S. can rack up 800–1,400+ mandatory clinical hours before they graduate — and not one of them is paid.
In this episode, The Gritty Nurse Amie Archibald-Varley, traces that unpaid-labour model back to its actual origin: Florence Nightingale's 1860s training school and the 2,000+ hospital "training schools" that turned her vision into free ward staff within a generation. From there, Amie tracks how nursing education got professionalized, expensive, and gendered — comparing it to paid co-ops in engineering and the trades, unpacking why nursing training stayed unpaid while other fields didn't, and revisiting a piece of history most nurses have never heard of: a U.S. federal program that paid 85% of the country's nursing students to go to school, eighty years ago.
If you've ever wondered why nursing students foot the bill and do the labour, this is the episode that connects all of it — with the receipts.
Free Labour: The Real Cost of Becoming a Nurse
Why do nursing students do the labour of employees and pay like tourists — in both Canada and the United States? In this episode, we go back over 150 years to trace exactly how we got here.
In this episode:
The NCLEX fee increase hitting Canada and the U.S. on the same day in 2027 — the first change to either fee since 2000
Florence Nightingale's 1860 training school at St Thomas' Hospital, the two-tier "probationer" system, and how fast her model turned into free hospital labour once it crossed the Atlantic to Bellevue, New Haven, and Massachusetts General
How nursing education moved from hospital basements into universities — and how the cost moved onto students while the unpaid-labour model stayed exactly the same
Real tuition and clinical-hour numbers from both countries, and testimonials from nursing students describing placements as "free labour"
How nursing's unpaid clinical model compares to paid co-ops in engineering and the trades — including real wage data
The gender question underneath all of this: who gets the paid seat, and what that means for lifetime earnings
The U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps — a WWII-era federal program that paid full tuition, stipends, and housing for nursing students, reaching 85% of all nursing students in the country by 1945 — and what today's hospital-run "earn while you learn" programs (Duke, HCA, SSM Health, and others) prove is still possible
What actually needs to change, and where the pressure is already building
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* Listen on Apple Podcasts – : The Gritty Nurse Podcast on Apple Apple Podcasts 
https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-gritty-nurse/id1493290782
* Watch on YouTube –  https://www.youtube.com/@thegrittynursepodcast
Stay Connected:
Website: grittynurse.com
Instagram: @grittynursepod
TikTok: @thegrittynursepodcast
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064212216482
X (Twitter): @GrittyNurse
Collaborations & Inquiries: For sponsorship opportunities or to book Amie for speaking engagements, visit: grittynurse.com/contact
REFERENCES
National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) — NCLEX registration fee increase announcement, effective February 1, 2027
British Journal of Nursing — "The legacy of Florence Nightingale's educational reforms for nursing"
Wikipedia — Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery
The Hospital (1917), "The Nightingale School and St. Thomas's Hospital," via PMC
Old Operating Theatre Museum — "Why did nursing need to be reformed in the 19th century?"
Springer Publishing Company — "History of Nursing Education"
Mapping Care Project, University of Illinois Chicago
Penn Nursing Historical Archive, University of Pennsylvania
BC College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM) — Centennial report
Health Human Resources (HHR-RHS) — "Introduction to the Health Workforce in Canada"
Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, via CBC News
AECC Global — Canadian nursing tuition data
Amber Student — international nursing tuition comparisons
University Magazine (2023) — Canadian nursing student testimonials
CBC News, First Person — Eyasu Yakob, nursing student account
Western Governors University (WGU) — clinical hour requirements by program type
ScienceDirect — "Variability of clinical hours in prelicensure nursing programs" (2020)
BMC Health Services Research (2024), Beks et al. — scoping review on unpaid clinical placements
National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) — 2025 Guide to Compensation for Interns & Co-ops
Statistics Canada — "Insights on Canadian Society," co-op participation by field and gender
International Council of Nurses, citing WHO–ILO joint analysis (2022)
Engineers Canada — gender composition data, via University Affairs
U.S. National Science Foundation — engineering enrollment by gender
Statistics Canada 2016 Census data, via Global News — median salary comparison, engineers vs. nurses aged 25–34
NurseJournal.org — gender pay gap in nursing
ScienceDirect — integrative review of gender discrimination in nursing (2021)
Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand (2025), Watson et al. — earnings catch-up modelling, nurses vs. police officers
National Women's History Museum — "Making a Difference: The U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps"
U.S. National Park Service — Cadet Nurse Corps history
Smithsonian National Museum of American History — "Creating the Cadet Nurse Corps for World War II"
Washington State Nurses Association (WSNA) — "The push to recognize the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps as veterans"
Duke University Health System — Duke Nurse Extern (DNE) careers page
SSM Health — Student Nurse Externship / Earn While You Learn program page
HCA Healthcare — Student Nurse Externship job listings
University of Washington School of Nursing — LTC Externship program page
U.S. Public Health Service — SRCOSTEP program information
Ontario Health — Enhanced Extern Program
Government of Ontario — Learn and Stay Grant

This week, grief was impossible to avoid — Hayden Panettiere, Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, and Peter Cullen all left us within days of each other, and the collective mourning was loud, public, and completely normal. But what happens when the person who dies isn't a celebrity — it's your patient, your coworker, or someone in your own family, and you're the healthcare provider who's supposed to hold it together anyway?
In this episode on The Gritty Nurse with Amie Archibald-Varley, I get personal about my own experience with grief, then break down exactly how nurses and healthcare providers are trained — from nursing school through clinicals to the bedside — to suppress it. I dig into why that training is maladaptive (with the research to back it up: burnout, complicated grief, even mortality risk), how it complicates our ability to grieve our own losses, and what "good grief" could actually look like if we stopped bottling it up — for our own health, and for our patients' care too.
It's time we stop teaching healthcare providers that big girls and big boys don't cry.
This episode explores the often overlooked topic of grief among healthcare providers, emphasizing how the current training and workplace culture suppress emotional expression and the profound impact this has on mental health and patient care.
 keywords
healthcare, grief, burnout, emotional health, nursing, death, compassion, Schwartz rounds, mental health, professional culture
 Listen on Apple Podcasts – : The Gritty Nurse Podcast on Apple Apple Podcasts 
https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-gritty-nurse/id1493290782
* Watch on YouTube –  https://www.youtube.com/@thegrittynursepodcast
Stay Connected:
Website: grittynurse.com
Instagram: @grittynursepod
TikTok: @thegrittynursepodcast
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064212216482
X (Twitter): @GrittyNurse
Collaborations & Inquiries: For sponsorship opportunities or to book Amie for speaking engagements, visit: grittynurse.com/contact
Please LIKE, COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE!
Stay Gritty!

Would your hospital admit that staff get assaulted on the job — in public, with real numbers?
St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton just did. And it's exposing a crisis most hospitals would rather not talk about.
In this episode, I sit down with St. Joe's CEO Mike Heenan to unpack the numbers behind their decision to go public: at least 4 staff members verbally or physically assaulted every day — roughly 1,400 incidents a year, and that's just what gets reported. We dig into what it took to make transparency the policy, not the exception, and what other health systems are still avoiding.
We also look at what this means nationally, using the CFNU's 2025 National Nurses Survey:
9 in 10 Canadian nurses experienced verbal abuse from a patient in the past year
Workers' comp claims for violence against nurses have nearly tripled in Ontario since 2012
Healthcare workers are 5x more likely to be attacked on the job than workers in any other sector
Between 2006–2021, only 12 Canadian court cases involving a nurse victim resulted in a sentencing decision
Mike shares what it actually takes to build a safer hospital — leadership buy-in, community engagement, and the willingness to say "yes, this happens here." We also break down why I'm supporting Bill S-233, which would require courts to treat an assault against a healthcare worker as an aggravating factor at sentencing — meaning judges would have to weigh it as a more serious offence, not just business as usual.
If you're a nurse, a healthcare worker, or someone who's ever wondered why hospitals stay quiet about this — this episode is for you.
Fun fact I stumbled on while researching this: St. Joe's traces back to a group of Sisters of St. Joseph caring for cholera victims in railway sheds in the 1850s — that origin story alone would make a killer future episode.
About Mike Heenan
Dr. Mike Heenan is President and CEO of St. Joseph's Health System and President of St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton. He joined St. Joe's in November 2023 and was named permanent President and CEO of the health system in June 2025. Before St. Joe's, he served as Ontario's Assistant Deputy Minister, Hospitals and Capital, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and has held executive leadership roles across various hospital settings. He holds a PhD in Business Administration/Health Policy Management from McMaster University.
Connect with Mike: LinkedIn
Careers at St. Joe's
Interested in joining the team fighting for safer, more transparent healthcare workplaces? St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton is hiring. Browse open positions: joinstjoes.ca

In this new episode on The Gritty Nurse Podcast with Amie Archibald-Varley, we examine the case of Lindsay Clancy through the lens of postpartum psychosis and the catastrophic gaps in mental health care that allowed it to go unrecognized and untreated. I start with the question that should be asked before every postpartum antidepressant prescription: has this patient been screened for bipolar disorder? It's now considered the gold standard of care — and it only became standard practice because of this case. From there, we talk about what early screening should look like more broadly, what coordinated care between obstetric and psychiatric providers actually requires, and why compassion — not judgment — has to be the starting point if we want to prevent the next tragedy instead of just mourning it.
If you're here for sensationalism, this isn't the episode for you. These are real people, a real family, and real suffering. Our purpose is not to relitigate what happened, but to ask why it happened, and what needs to change so it doesn't happen again.
This is the conversation healthcare needs to be having — about postpartum psychosis, about the mothers falling through the cracks, and about the systemic changes required to catch them before it's too late.
keywords
 
postpartum psychosis, mental health, systemic failure, screening, care coordination, maternal health, psychiatric emergency, postpartum depression, bipolar disorder, healthcare gaps
 
 
 key  topics
 
Postpartum psychosis and its symptoms
System failures in mental health care and prescription practices
Importance of early screening for bipolar disorder and depression
Systematic gaps in postpartum care and follow-up
The Lindsay Clancy case and systemic accountability
Role of healthcare providers in recognizing red flags
Need for coordinated care among multiple prescribers
Impact of medication polypharmacy and withdrawal
Advocacy for improved postpartum mental health protocols
Community and systemic responsibility in preventing tragedies
* Listen on Apple Podcasts – : The Gritty Nurse Podcast on Apple Apple Podcasts 
https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-gritty-nurse/id1493290782
* Watch on YouTube –  https://www.youtube.com/@thegrittynursepodcast
Stay Connected:
Website: grittynurse.com
Instagram: @grittynursepod
TikTok: @thegrittynursepodcast
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064212216482
X (Twitter): @GrittyNurse
Collaborations & Inquiries: For sponsorship opportunities or to book Amie for speaking engagements, visit: grittynurse.com/contact

Frontline pressures have reached a boiling point. In this swapcast episode, nurses Erica and Amie tackle the wave of nursing strikes across Massachusetts (MNA) and British Columbia (BCNU), exploring what these recent labor actions reveal about the true state of healthcare.
Together, they dive into the harsh realities nurses are standing up against—from unsafe staffing ratios and lack of workplace respect to burnout and corporate greed. Erica and Amie also address the elephant in the room: "scab nurses." They break down the ethical, emotional, and financial strain traveling replacement nurses place on striking staff, how hospital systems use high-paid temporary labor to undercut union power, and the complex reality of nursing ethics vs. corporate greed.
More importantly, they share actionable insights on how nurses can build genuine solidarity, mobilize for patient safety, and use their collective voice to drive real structural change. Whether you're on the floor or on the picket line, this is a conversation about standing tall for the profession.
🔗 Connect with Nurse Erica:
Podcast: Nurses Uncorked on Apple Podcasts & Spotify

Instagram & TikTok: @the.nurse.erica

Web: nurseerica.com

Listen on Apple Podcasts – : The Gritty Nurse Podcast on Apple Apple Podcasts 
https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-gritty-nurse/id1493290782
* Watch on YouTube –  https://www.youtube.com/@thegrittynursepodcast
Stay Connected:
Website: grittynurse.com
Instagram: @grittynursepod
TikTok: @thegrittynursepodcast
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064212216482
X (Twitter): @GrittyNurse
Collaborations & Inquiries: For sponsorship opportunities or to book Amie for speaking engagements, visit: grittynurse.com/contact