MY JOURNEY TO NURSING REGISTRATION IN TEXAS, USA : A GUIDE FOR NIGERIAN NURSES.

As we all know or must have heard, nurses are paid very well in USA, the opportunities, possibilities and career growth is endless and if you are ambitious like me, you would have thought of relocating too. if you have, then i have good news for you, it’s not as hard and complicated as it seems if you follow the right steps.

You don’t need any agent to assist you with your nursing registration, you can do it yourself. I repeat, YOU CAN DO IT YOURSELF.

Now enough with this chatter and let’s start already.

To register as a nurse in USA you have to first of all decide on the state you want to work in, I’m not going to give the pros and cons of each state because this post is about my personal journey so I’m going to be limited to what I did and didn’t do.

I decided to choose the state of Texas because in my opinion the Texas Board of nursing is not as strict to foreign nurses when compared to some other states. For example, they don’t require English exams, they are customer friendly, they take their time to respond and answer all your questions. I know this because i took a long time to research and arrive at this conclusion. Moreover working as a nurse in Texas also has its benefits like no income taxes, it’s a compact state and most of its population are black. I’m not racist but i figured being in a new country with no friends and family close by it would be comforting to see more blacks around you.

After choosing a state, the next step is to register with CGFNS

This can be done at www.cgfns.org
Take note that the application fee is $350

CGFNS registration /application procedure

Log in to https://www.cgfns.org/cerpassweb/register.jsp to create a new application. Your application is only valid for 1 year so i would advise that your application fee of $350 and your credentials are readily available. Your documents has to be sent by the appropriate authorities issuing them and must not come from you the applicant.

When you log into the cgfns page, go to the drop down menu and scroll to the almost the last part where you will find..

LOGIN
Cgfns connect (for applicants)
Cgfns connect (for state boards of Nursing)
Click on the cgfns connect for applicants. It will take you to another login page where you can register as a new user.
PLEASE ENTER THE REQUESTED INFORMATION The form is something like this.

*Please indicate type of user : Applicant

*Have you ever used cgfns service : No

*If yes then enter your cgfns I’d: I left mine blank

* Would you like to receive CGFNS News updates?: Yes

*First (Given) name : your name

*Last name: your surname

*Email address : use an email you have access to. If necessary open one specially for this purpose but do well to write your password down cause this is what they will use to communicate with you

*retype email address:

*Text message number :

*Registration/License Number: R. N 000000

*Required Icon Date of Birth: Month, Day and Year: Date must be two digits. Add 0 in front if yours is 1 digit

*Please Indicate Your Birth Country:

*User Name: (6 – 10 characters long):

* Password: (6 – 10 characters long):

*Re-type Password:

*Please select a question you would like to be asked if you forget your user name or password:

*Please select an answer to the security question:

*How would you like to receive correspondence? : choose email

*How did you hear about us?: internet

*Enter characters you see in the picture below: take note of the upper and lower case letters.

* Accept CGFNS International Terms and Conditions:

click on CREATE USER.
Congratulations you have started your cgfns application. Now wait for some seconds to receive the verification email from cgfns.

When you get the email from autoreplycgfns, click on the verification link and it will take you back to the cgfns connect page. Now put in your username and password and log into your account.

*upload your passport sized photo online. I didn’t.

*Click on purchase services from cgfns international
Read the service wizard information and click on Begin selection process

* cgfns id number finder : click on I am a new user and have not used CGFNS or any of its affiliates before.

*CGFNS Connect Service Purchase Wizard
Now answer the following questions as it applies to you.

*Are you a nurse?: Yes
*What is the country of your entry level nursing education?: Nigeria
*Do you have or have you ever held a registration or license issued by the respective authorities from the country where entry level nursing education was completed? : Yes

*Select a service
Choose credentials evaluation service (CES). For Texas and other states except New York.
Or Credentials verification service(CVS) for New York state only. (the pathophysiology of New york state registration is totally different from other states. Please do not apply my experience if you are registering with new york)

Click on NEXT to take you to the next page.

*CES RECIPIENTS
*What type of CES report would you like? Choose professional report if your aim is to register with a state Board of Nursing, get licensed and start working. Choose Academic report if your aim is to send the report to a university where you want to further your studies or upgrade to a Bsn. I chose the former.

Wait for the page to refresh itself so that the other questions following your chosen report will come up.
If you picked professional report then read on, if not then this is where our journey ends for those choosing the academic route.

*CES report type: Professional Report

*What type of license are you applying for?: Registered Nurse. (you cannot use two stones to kill a bird here like for Canadian registration where you can choose both LPN and RN. It’s either you pick lpn or RN. I had to deliberate for a long time before finally going for RN because I was thinking “what if my credentials are not equivalent to RN, wouldn’t it be better to pick lpn so that my money won’t be wasted?) But after many calls to cgfns and emails to Texas Bon, I was advised to go for RN. just in case you were thinking the same thing

*Have you already passed the NCLEX exam?: No
*for Recipient #1Are you applying for Licensure in the US?: Yes
*State Board of Nursing: TEXAS BOARD OF NURSE EXAMINERS. ( you can choose more than one state but additional charges apply. I choose just Texas.)
*My recipient is on the list above: Yes

Click on the SUBMIT button