On Sunday 30 March, the big day arrived. The company’s training coordinator warmly welcomed twelve motivated young women from India at Hanover Airport. They began their three-year training programme to become nursing professionals at PFSH.
Just two days later, the programme began. To ease their transition, the training company organised a comprehensive onboarding programme during the first week. As well as receiving important information about the training programme and life in Germany, the new trainees gained initial insights into their future working environment.
Indian nursing staff are recruited in close cooperation with a language school in India. There, prospective trainees learn German before moving to Europe — a decisive advantage when it comes to successfully grasping the complex content of nursing training. This partnership with the language school has been in place since 2023 and has proven extremely successful. Many students have already started nursing training with us in this way.
However, there is clear potential for optimisation: visa regulations often only permit entry one day before the start of training. Having a settling-in period to familiarise oneself with the new environment, culture and life in Europe would be very beneficial. We hope that a political solution will be found soon to give future trainees more lead time. This would be particularly important for young people living far from home for the first time.