Yachtmaster Fast-track Recomendations please.

[Toutvabien]

My 18 year old daughter , who has been quite extensively sailing since early childhood, is interested in doing a YM Fast-track after her A levels this summer to enable her to perhaps work in the industry for a while.

Any experience, ideas or observations about sailing schools that are good at this sort of course gratefully received.

 

[[70521]]

If she has been extensively sailing since childhood why should she need to do a YM Fast-Track? If she is up to speed and got the experience why not contact a school and do a 5 day pre-exam course and then the exam. I know they do this a Plymouth Sailing School (http://www.plymsail.co.uk/) get her to ring Richard and talk things over. Other schools must offer the same facilities.

 

[PurpleKate]

I have heard good things from friends who have done it with Hamble School of Yachting. I did some RYA quals with them and found them very professional (No connection).

 

[PurpleKate]

Camelia makes a good point, you dont have to do the whole scheme with Hamble School, one friend just did the last module CS to YM

 

[l'escargot]

You need more than just YM to break into the industry these days. Have a look at UKSA, they are churning people out with lots of add ons and have the follow up for helping people to find employment.

 

[Toutvabien]

Thanks for the responses and suggestions, the point about not needing to do the whole 14-16 week YM FastTrack is a very good one. The key issue is getting her confident in bossing a crew though as well as getting the actual ticket.

I have spoken to a couple of providers and one of them made exactly that point and suggested that given her previous experience and mileage that a shorter version of the scheme would be appropriate, with perhaps an emphasis towards the skippering and navigational theory. Sounds as if it could be a runner.

 

[alant]

Thanks for the responses and suggestions, the point about not needing to do the whole 14-16 week YM FastTrack is a very good one. The key issue is getting her confident in bossing a crew though as well as getting the actual ticket.

I have spoken to a couple of providers and one of them made exactly that point and suggested that given her previous experience and mileage that a shorter version of the scheme would be appropriate, with perhaps an emphasis towards the skippering and navigational theory. Sounds as if it could be a runner.

Has she done the required 'skippered passages'?

 

[Toutvabien]

Has she done the required 'skippered passages'?

No, the skippering is a key issue that I was discussing with the sailing school. She has done about 10,000 miles, loads of long multi-day passages with significant night hours and has been sailing in some very varied locations but none as skipper. What they were saying was that they would focus on getting the experience of skippering as part of the training, as well as ensuring that she does not reproduce too many of my bad habits that she has learnt over the years when it comes to navigation.

 

[nickd]

My daughter did YM at UKSA a few years ago
She is now skipper of a 65 foot Oyster and a YMI in the med and loving life
UKSA do a very good job of training people for this sort of work but please ensure that your daughter is well aware that it is still a very male dominated world and young females will get an awful lot of prejudice.

 

[laika]

A lot will of course depend on individual instructors but don't bank on "effectively bossing people around" being part of the course. During one of these fasttrack courses the candidates will inevitably mesh as a crew. There's a huge difference between "managing" people with the same skill level as you who you've sailed a couple of thousand miles with already and managing mixed abilities who you may never have sailed with before. Sailing schools try and mix up these course by putting YM pupils with comp crew but while there's an instructor on board they're the one's *really* in charge and providing a safety net. The "self skippering" time where fasttrackers take a boat out without an instructor are hugely valuable in learning to make decisions without the safety net of an authority figure, but in those situations if the going gets really tough the candidates are actually part of an equal-ability team rather than the skipper being the lone individual holding things together. Can that be "taught"? Actually yes, I think good pointers can be given (though only experience will "prove" it) but I'm not sure that it's part of the syllabus so will be utterly the luck of draw in the instructor you get.

(my opinion: YMMV