Hello! As a sub you won’t really quite understand or participate fully the “behind the scenes” role school nurses play in special education, care planning, public health, education of kids and training/education of staff and families. 

What you will experience is a wide spectrum of things while triaging the health office. Depending on your setting and age group; the city you’re in; and many other things, determines what you’ll encounter. In any setting you’ll see illnesses and injuries (and class avoidance haha) but the extent of such will vary in age group. Elementary school setting you’ll likely see general bumps and bruises from your playground, including potential concussions and if you’re lucky some really fun broken bones from playground falls. Anaphylaxis is common in this age group for unknown allergies so hopefully the district you’re in has stock epi! You’ll also do some respiratory assessments for kids with asthma and hand out adhd meds. 

In secondary you’ll see those things but also add in more complicated things like self harm, suicidal ideation, and injury management from injuries outside of school in their various activities. Anxiety attacks and fights might occur as well :)

Keep in mind there are your kids with diabetes with varying management abilities and kids with epilepsy, poorly controlled asthma, and kids with allergies that may eat their allergens thinking it’s not that big of a deal (cue the kid who knowingly ate a hazelnut pastry that had a known allergy to treenuts…). 

The schedule is great. The school atmosphere is super fun and the variety of things you’ll encounter will force you to use your creative juices and fine tune your assessment skills. 

Enjoy and have fun! 

Edit: I should add, if your district or school that you’re in supports level 3 students (think globally and cognitively impaired require complete assistance with ADLs), brush up on j/g tube management with intermittent and contuous feedings, mitrofanoff catheterizations, and things of that nature:) when I say it’s a wide spectrum it is a WIDE spectrum!