How could RYA training be improved?

I think the whole thing needs a total rethink.

The format is still rooted in the 1970s when the transition between being a coastal sailor and taking the monumental step to push off across the channel and 'loosing sight of land' was massive. The idea of 'offshore' being a 60 mile passage was predicated on Solent sailors having the wherewithal to go to France. Now distance alone is irrelevant - you're no more 'lost' in the middle of the ocean than you are in the Solent.

So the divisions between the different 'levels' should be something more relevant than simple 'mileage'. etc, etc. So much to change.

The culture of the teaching also needs to change to become a relevant force to encourage greater participation and skills at all levels. The continuation of ex-armed services, ex-police, old blokes filling in their time from early retirement while offsetting the costs of their boat shouldn't be the backbone of the instructional cadre.
 
I think a lot of changes are already in flight. The Radar course was being withdrawn last I heard as the content just doesn't apply to modern integrated kit.

Requirement for celestial to attain the ocean cert should be removed in my opinion, it's simply not needed for ocean sailing in 2022. I'm not saying it's not fun to learn and use, but given that insurance companies want to see competence levels it seems odd to base this on using a sextant.

Agree with Motor Sailor, the mileage thing makes very little sense, and coastal skipper makes no sense as it's literally the same course as day skipper. This should be "skipper" and the next level ought to be "Yachtmaster" each with one level.

Far more emphasis should be on going sailing to get experience rather than taking the next course up. The current RYA logbook feels more like stamp collecting than learning, and that's not just for sailing.
 
Yes for an ocean ticket, it's probably more important that the mechanical repair skills and first aid requirements reflect the degree of isolation from outside help, before they demand more than the most rudimentary working knowledge of sun/run/sun as a navigational backup.

There should also be more subdivisions for size. I think it's marvellous that someone who has circumnavigated in their tiller steered Vancouver 275 with an Aries, via all the southern capes, should be eligible for the Ocean Gold Standard Sailing Supremo award, but lets not kid ourselves that this necessarily implies they have all transferable skills needed to skipper a 75ft modern superyacht. There should be a limit of a skippers 'qualification' of about the size and complexity of yacht in which they are both experienced and examined.
 
I'd argue size and vessel is experience, not a qualification. Much as the RYA would love to create more badges and courses
 
lustyd said:
I'd argue size and vessel is experience, not a qualification. Much as the RYA would love to create more badges and courses
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Do you have any evidence to share that “RYA would love to create more badges and courses”?

Within the sail cruising scheme, I can recall 3 courses being introduced over the last 20 years or so. Start Yachting (practical) and Essential Navigation and Seamanship (Shorebased) were introduced to try to increase new participants to sailing. Professional Practices and Responsibilities was introduced for those needing to have their qualifications commercially endorsed.

The G158 logbook is, in my view, very informative as it clearly outlines each progressive step within the scheme. Towards the back of the logbook is space for the individual to record their achievement. I’d venture to say that most people consider completing a course as a personal achievement, few consider the certificates as badges.

A key aim of the Coastal Skipper course is to introduce longer passages, by day and by night. Electronic aids to navigation is but one small part of passage making. The logbook shows the full syllabus and is worth a read.

The United Nations through the IMO set the standards for seafarers. Our government delegates its UN obligations through the Dept for Transport, in turn the MCA. Celestial navigation is said to be a requirement for ocean passage making by the IMO. Note that our Certificates of Competence are issued by RYA on behalf of the MCA.
 
Skylark said:
Do you have any evidence to share that “RYA would love to create more badges and courses”?
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Yes, everything about their organisation is evidence of this. I have at least 15 RYA badges myself, if not more, it's worse than joining the Brownies.
 
Skylark said:
So you think they have no value but have done at least 15 of them. I think Einstein coined a suitable and appropriate phrase ???
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For various reasons. Some were required to drive the RIB at a dive club, some while on a beach holiday while sailing dinghy's/windsurfing and some learning to sail. Add to that RADAR because I learned when a course was necessary, VHF, motor boat and they add up pretty quickly. Dinghy and windsurf are probably big offenders as you get your first badge effectively for launching the craft without injury. The main one I object to in yachting as I said above is the needless overlap between day and coastal skipper which are literally the same week of sailing in many instances. The multiple levels of yachtmaster are a money grab in my eyes, either you're a competent yachtsman or you're not.
 
lustyd said:
The main one I object to in yachting as I said above is the needless overlap between day and coastal skipper which are literally the same week of sailing in many instances.
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Can't agree with that. The difference in what is expected of a coastal skipper (now called Yachtmaster Coastal) and a Day skipper is pretty big I think. A lot more skills are required to be demonstrated. MOB under sail etc.

The one thing that I found odd going through the DS - CS - YM path was how little emphasis was placed on actual sailing ability, as distinct to ability to manoeuvred a boat or navigate it.

For example, on my YM exam we were running downwind in 25-30 knots of breeze. The examiner invited me to step below to talk through my prepared passage plan. This left 2 other candidates on deck. After a few minutes they called down and asked if I could be allowed to come back on deck to helm, as neither of them felt up to the task. They both passed, whilst demonstrating (to me at least) that they were not comfortable with actually helming a boat in what I considered fairly normal conditions.
They also both had fairly basic sail trimming skills, even by cruising standards, and were not doing things like adjusting sheet leads or kicker tension at all.
Both of them could clearly navigate well, better than me for sure, and both were good at the set manoeuvres, coming alongside, MOB etc and had pretty good man management skills. But neither were really all that good at actually sailing.

I'm not suggesting that all YM candidates need to be hotshot racing sailors, but really at no point past DS was sail trim or helming technique ever really mentioned. Everything was about nav and manoeuvres.
And of course it's more than possible to get to YM without ever having flown a spinnaker, which I feel is a mistake.
 
flaming said:
The difference in what is expected of a coastal skipper (now called Yachtmaster Coastal) and a Day skipper is pretty big I think
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You should go and refresh your understanding of their offering before commenting. Yachtmaster coastal and Coastal Skipper are not the same thing, and is exactly what I was saying. Day skipper and Coastal Skipper are practical courses, the various yachtmasters are certificates of competence, all done in as many steps as they can get away with.

RYA Sail Cruising Training | Courses for beginners and professionals

Edit to add that I just looked and it seems CS is actually a subset of the DS content.
 
lustyd said:
You should go and refresh your understanding of their offering before commenting. Yachtmaster coastal and Coastal Skipper are not the same thing, and is exactly what I was saying. Day skipper and Coastal Skipper are practical courses, the various yachtmasters are certificates of competence, all done in as many steps as they can get away with.

RYA Sail Cruising Training | Courses for beginners and professionals

Edit to add that I just looked and it seems CS is actually a subset of the DS content.
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No need to be rude.. But my point still stands.

The Coastal skipper course now offered is essentially the Coastal Skipper course of old. No real change and there is a course completion certificate signed off by the instructor in the same way as DS. This was always the case, and lead to confusion between people who had the course completion cert, and the old style CS qualification which (when I did it) was an examined qualification. That is now called Yachtmaster Coastal to avoid this confusion. What is being taught on the courses has not, as I understand it, changed much.

The standard to get an instructor to sign off a course completion at CS will be much higher than at DS. You might be doing the same basic things - i.e sailing to somewhere with an MOB exercise on the way, but the way you do that MOB, and the latitude that you will be given in your standard of doing it will be much more exacting.
DS are expected to always use the engine in MOB for example. CS will be expected to demonstrate MOB under sail.
 
Some interesting comments, always worth finding out how people think. Perhaps some are also unaware of the regular changes that enhance the training?

It also appears the 'mission' is overlooked as well. All the training courses are designed to achieve clearly defined abilities.

Competent crew. Obvious really. Useful crew member.

Day Skipper. Skipper a yacht in familiar waters by day. Converts commercially to 20 miles from a safe haven.

Yachtmaster Coastal. Skipper a yacht on coastal passages by day and night. Converts commercially to up to 60 miles from a safe haven. The 60 miles may surprise some to learn that's in a rescue helicopter response time originally.

Yachtmaster Offshore. Skipper a cruising yacht on passages up to 150 miles from a safe haven. This is for more experienced sailors who may have to deal with difficult situations a long way from help.

Yachtmaster Ocean. For experienced skippers undertaking passages of any length in all parts of the world. A part of which is navigation without electronic aids.

All of this stuff can be found on the RYA website training pages. As always, feedback is welcomed.

I think a lot of previous comments may well be better understood after a bit of research ......
 
flaming said:
No need to be rude.. But my point still stands.

The Coastal skipper course now offered is essentially the Coastal Skipper course of old. No real change and there is a course completion certificate signed off by the instructor in the same way as DS. This was always the case, and lead to confusion between people who had the course completion cert, and the old style CS qualification which (when I did it) was an examined qualification. That is now called Yachtmaster Coastal to avoid this confusion. What is being taught on the courses has not, as I understand it, changed much.

The standard to get an instructor to sign off a course completion at CS will be much higher than at DS. You might be doing the same basic things - i.e sailing to somewhere with an MOB exercise on the way, but the way you do that MOB, and the latitude that you will be given in your standard of doing it will be much more exacting.
DS are expected to always use the engine in MOB for example. CS will be expected to demonstrate MOB under sail.
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There is a big gap between Day Skipper and Yachtmaster Coastal as you rightly point out.

The theory courses have all undergone a major upgrade over the last few years and are now very good.

The RYA is not an organisation that stands still. That's reserved for long held prejudices of some sailors. :)
 
I didn't think I was being rude, you clearly didn't understand the offerings so I highlighted that and suggested you go and have a read. No offence intended.
 
lustyd said:
I didn't think I was being rude, you clearly didn't understand the offerings so I highlighted that and suggested you go and have a read. No offence intended.
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I can assure you I fully understand the offerings, as I hope you can see from my clarification. The misunderstanding was that I was thinking you were referring to the CS exam of old, and not the course completion cert. My mistake there, but in my defence I have found that the "yachtmaster Coastal" name change hasn't really resonated and most people just refer to that as CS.

The actual point I was making though, that the standard between the 2 taught courses is quite a lot larger than you are suggesting, stands though.
 
capnsensible said:
There is a big gap between Day Skipper and Yachtmaster Coastal as you rightly point out.

The theory courses have all undergone a major upgrade over the last few years and are now very good.

The RYA is not an organisation that stands still. That's reserved for long held prejudices of some sailors. :)
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Yes, but not the Coastal Skipper course, which is to all intents and purposes identical to the Day Skipper course. It doesn't really bother me that much, but when someone asks what can be improved it's a very obvious example. Personally I did both DS and CS and was disapointed to be given the exact same content and training on both. I got a week of sailing out of it, but that doesn't justify a course since I could just as easily have done a week of sailing with the same instructor as a charter. I learned far more when I sailed up the Irish sea with the instructor from DS in October on a "pleasure sail" on his own boat a few months later. One of the things I learned was not to trust an instructor to navigate to a pub in Holyhead!
 
lustyd said:
Yes, but not the Coastal Skipper course, which is to all intents and purposes identical to the Day Skipper course. It doesn't really bother me that much, but when someone asks what can be improved it's a very obvious example. Personally I did both DS and CS and was disapointed to be given the exact same content and training on both. I got a week of sailing out of it, but that doesn't justify a course since I could just as easily have done a week of sailing with the same instructor as a charter. I learned far more when I sailed up the Irish sea with the instructor from DS in October on a "pleasure sail" on his own boat a few months later. One of the things I learned was not to trust an instructor to navigate to a pub in Holyhead!
Click to expand...
Perhaps if you looked at the two different course syllabus requirements you will see they are nothing like identical.

You might also benefit from the experience of someone who has taught both practical courses hundreds of times.
 
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