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Hi all!
Not sure if this question has been asked but anywho, I'm moving to Minot,ND as a CNA and Pre-Nursing Student on a relocation pkg for a hospital (Trinity I believe) through a staffing company. Everything is pretty much covered but I need to know if Minot has any city bus lines, I always come up with Greyhound in the search engines but I'm not talking about that "type" of bus. I won't have a car (I know, it's best to have a car but I really am doing the best that I can right now.) but unfortunately I just won't at least not right away. How do you guys get around besides car in Minot? How much are cabs? If there is a city bus, how much is it to ride it to and from? I'll be moving probably by the middle of the month (just found out) And please if you can tell me anything else about Minot or perhaps their Nursing Programs( LPN, RN more specifically) that would be great. I've done general research on a few of the schools I'm interested in Williston State for LPN and Minot State for my BSN so if anyone has attended either school can you tell me what you liked about it? Didn't like about it? Any supplies I'll need? How are the instructors?
I don't mind sacrificing on conveniences or comfort , I adapt to my environment pretty quickly and with ease. I'm from NC and I understand the weather is cold in ND. Do you guys have 4 seasons? How cold exactly can it get in ND? How is the crime rate? What cities should I avoid? Are there any bad neighborhoods?
My wife is from Minot....and I have visited there quite a bit. There is a city bus service... here is the info on that... City Bus Schedule/Route Maps
I would strongly check where you will be living and working in relation to the bus service and also very importantly your working hours.
Midday bus service operates Monday through Friday on a half-hour schedule between the hours of 9:00 a.m. to the take home run at 4:30 p.m. There is no Saturday or Sunday service. There is an earlier run on school days only.
But as you can tell there is no weekend service nor service past 430 pm or early in the morning.
There are two cab companies in town....Minot Taxi Cab and Central Cab but dont know fares....as I have never taken either one.
In regards to weather...we have 4 seasons... spring and fall are typically pretty short and variable....what I call winter runs from Nov 1 to March 31st....being anytime in that time span you can expect snow/cold temps....but each year can be different. Most of the time once you get past Thanksgiving then to mid Februrary you can expect below zero temps....some winters a lot...others not as much. Wind and blowing snow is the biggest issue you will face as the amount of snow itself is usually not a huge problem. Summers can be humid and warm....but rarely hot, and persistent humid weather like in NC is rare. From Labor Day to mid October is to me almost always the best season....as once you get a frost or a freeze the mosquitos die down and this period is typically the driest in terms of precipitation. Our springs April-May can be slow to arrive and highly variable with spring snow storms and rain storms. How cold can it get? It varies greatly....and all depends on what you call cold. -30 to -35F actual air temps are not uncommon once or twice each winter...but -15 to -25F for lows are much more common....and daytime highs -5 to 15F. You can have one or two mild breaks in the winter when temps go above freezing. Some winters snowcover is heavy and others light....but most years have at least some constant snowcover from mid Nov til mid March. Summers typically have highs 75 to 85...though can have some 90s and some cooler days with rain. Summer lows mainly in the 50s and 60s. Wind is a constant thing nearly yearround. Not damaging winds...but a constant 15 to 25 mph wind on many days.
Minot is growing fast and many new businesses are arriving....It is amazing the change in the 10 years I have been going there while visiting in-laws. It is to the point now it takes forever it seems to drive through town on Broadway. Minot had the river flood in 2011 and there is still some recovery going on as much of the river valley was damaged home-wise.
I dont know anything about nursing programs, education, there or in Williston. Univ of North Dakota in Grand Forks offers a large nursing program...but that is 3.5 hours east and is where I live/work.
Thank you so much! This really helps. I believe the place I'll be staying is called Big Dipper Housing according to google it's 10 minutes from the hospital not sure how accurate that is. It looks like I may be taking a cab for awhile when I tried the bus tab, nothing came up so I'm assuming the bus doesn't come by. I like cold weather better anyway so that doesn't bother me. Once again thank you so much, your reply really helped!
Thank you so much! This really helps. I believe the place I'll be staying is called Big Dipper Housing according to google it's 10 minutes from the hospital not sure how accurate that is. It looks like I may be taking a cab for awhile when I tried the bus tab, nothing came up so I'm assuming the bus doesn't come by. I like cold weather better anyway so that doesn't bother me. Once again thank you so much, your reply really helped!
Yes that's it. I guess Google isn't always right. All I was told is that it was about 6-8 miles from the Big Dipper and it was 4 levels high and mostly a skilled facility. That's as much info as the lady gave me about it.
From the looks of it you are out on Hwy 2/52 and then would come into downtown via Burdick Expressway. Like any travel time into town it would vary depending on traffic and Minot traffic isnt ...well let say .... the town is growing too fast for the road system it has IMO. I dont live in Minot only visited and stayed a few nights here/there over the years....but someone with real first hand knowledge can hopefully help you. Like me I live 7 miles from my work and with general stoplights/stop signs in town 7 miles can take 13-17 minutes. So yours probably 20-25....
Your housing would be out of town and even downtown no real crime worries....with the influx of so many people in the past few years, yes more things crime wise are happening, but using normal precautions would keep you safe. Hwy 83 or Broadway through town is a busy road with lots of businesses up on the north hill and esp the south side of town where much of the recent growth has been concentrated esp south of Hwy 2. They have North Dakota's first Sonic restaurant southwest of the mall.
Please be very aware of any type pf housing arrangement through Trinity or a staffing agency and Big Dipper housing. A couple months ago, a new hire where I work came to Minot with his girlfriend from North Carolina. She was a CNA working for Trinity at their nursing home facility (which is in a separate part of town than the actual hospital). They were also housed at Big Dipper housing. Although I don't know all the details, they only made it about a month here before they had to get money from family back home just to pay for their gas to leave. There is some kind of agreement that payment for your housing comes directly out of your paycheck. I don't know what you would be paying to stay there, but they were charged $1500 per month for a room in a 3 bedroom trailer house. By the time the rent was deducted from the two paychecks she got, they were left with $20 from each check for their living expenses for two weeks. They had a vehicle up here, but couldn't afford gas to get either one of them to work. He had to ask for an advance on his paycheck. He even called the store manager where I work and asked for rides to work, they were so desperate. None of us he worked with could believe the bind they were in. That's my first story regarding Trinity and how it may impact you.
Second story was told to me on June 5th @ the Jefferson Lines bus depot here in Minot. I was there with a family member who had come to Minot on the bus the day before. The bus ticket was messed up and we had to get it straightened out before the departure date. When we arrived, we saw a young gal we had seen the day before getting off the bus. She started to visit with us and told us that she had come to Minot to work @ Trinity nursing home as a CNA through a staffing agency, arrived the day before and had her first day of work that morning (it was about 1pm when this conversation took place). She said she was treated so badly there, that she quit without working the shift through and was getting on the bus to go back home. I was floored.
If you read any of my previous posts, you will see that I am not a fan of Trinity - haven't been for years and years. But when I heard those other stories, it only served to convince me further that there is something rotten within the whole organization.
I'm guessing there are other stories out there, some are probably successful, but I wonder how many other nightmare stories are out there as well. I wish there were somewhere you could go to find some really unbiased info on the staffing agency, Big Dipper Housing and Trinity.
If you do indeed decide to come to Minot, I wish you the very best at your new job and hope your future stays bright. Just be sure to have enough $$ to get home if it turns out that this experience wasn't what you thought it would be.
Please be very aware of any type pf housing arrangement through Trinity or a staffing agency and Big Dipper housing. A couple months ago, a new hire where I work came to Minot with his girlfriend from North Carolina. She was a CNA working for Trinity at their nursing home facility (which is in a separate part of town than the actual hospital). They were also housed at Big Dipper housing. Although I don't know all the details, they only made it about a month here before they had to get money from family back home just to pay for their gas to leave. There is some kind of agreement that payment for your housing comes directly out of your paycheck. I don't know what you would be paying to stay there, but they were charged $1500 per month for a room in a 3 bedroom trailer house. By the time the rent was deducted from the two paychecks she got, they were left with $20 from each check for their living expenses for two weeks. They had a vehicle up here, but couldn't afford gas to get either one of them to work. He had to ask for an advance on his paycheck. He even called the store manager where I work and asked for rides to work, they were so desperate. None of us he worked with could believe the bind they were in. That's my first story regarding Trinity and how it may impact you.
Second story was told to me on June 5th @ the Jefferson Lines bus depot here in Minot. I was there with a family member who had come to Minot on the bus the day before. The bus ticket was messed up and we had to get it straightened out before the departure date. When we arrived, we saw a young gal we had seen the day before getting off the bus. She started to visit with us and told us that she had come to Minot to work @ Trinity nursing home as a CNA through a staffing agency, arrived the day before and had her first day of work that morning (it was about 1pm when this conversation took place). She said she was treated so badly there, that she quit without working the shift through and was getting on the bus to go back home. I was floored.
If you read any of my previous posts, you will see that I am not a fan of Trinity - haven't been for years and years. But when I heard those other stories, it only served to convince me further that there is something rotten within the whole organization.
I'm guessing there are other stories out there, some are probably successful, but I wonder how many other nightmare stories are out there as well. I wish there were somewhere you could go to find some really unbiased info on the staffing agency, Big Dipper Housing and Trinity.
If you do indeed decide to come to Minot, I wish you the very best at your new job and hope your future stays bright. Just be sure to have enough $$ to get home if it turns out that this experience wasn't what you thought it would be.
Whoa! Thank you for informing me of this. That is so unfortunate and just plain evil. You have definitely given me some more questions to ask. I am definitely prepared with enough to return just in case it doesn't work out. I figured something had to be off since I've seen them advertising since the beginning of the year. I'm just going to see what happens and if it doesn't workout then I'll go elsewhere. I work at a very underpaid job right now so I thought I'd try my luck a bit and go outside NC, if this doesn't work I have a backup plan & a backup to that, I definitely didn't put all of my eggs in that one basket.
Whoa! Thank you for informing me of this. That is so unfortunate and just plain evil. You have definitely given me some more questions to ask. I am definitely prepared with enough to return just in case it doesn't work out. I figured something had to be off since I've seen them advertising since the beginning of the year. I'm just going to see what happens and if it doesn't workout then I'll go elsewhere. I work at a very underpaid job right now so I thought I'd try my luck a bit and go outside NC, if this doesn't work I have a backup plan & a backup to that, I definitely didn't put all of my eggs in that one basket.
I don't understand the intricacies of health care, I do know there are jobs n Fargo at Sanford, which is supposed to be a very fine organization. I also have seen openings at the VA.
Fargo is a decent town, big enough to have things happening, small enough to be friendly. If things don't work out in Minot, consider Fargo.
Cheers
Qazulight
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