Students' perceptions of nursing influence recruitment and retention in nursing education. Nursing education in the Netherlands differentiates two levels: Bachelor's (HBO-V) and intermediate vocational (MBO-V) level training, with MBO-V students accounting the majority. To avoid the expected nursing shortages, these students' perceptions of nursing need to be explored. We aimed to examine the orientation and attitudes of MBO-V students towards their future profession and their relation to demographic characteristics. A descriptive survey with a pretest-posttest design was conducted. Newly enrolled MBO-V students completed a questionnaire at the beginning and after five months of education, consisting of the Nursing Orientation Tool, the Nursing Attitude Questionnaire and demographic characteristics. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test, Mann-Whitney U test and regression analysis were used for data analyses. At the first time point, students agreed most with statements related to caring, nursing expertise, advocacy, empathy, and knowledge. After five months, students were more life-oriented, while caring, nursing expertise, advocacy, and empathy decreased. Selecting nursing as a firstchoice programme and aiming for a nursing career influenced students' orientation and attitudes towards nursing positively. Being aware of students' orientation and attitudes towards nursing can help nursing educators in recruitment and retention strategies.