News from Cowes - a busy winter

Samantha has had a great winter completing her Tri Watersports Internship at the UK sailing Academy at Cowes.

Learning, boat building skills in the
workshop.  Mould something, break it
 and repair it four simple steps, now I
 can help dad who usually mends
our prangs!

Commencing in November she spent several very cold weeks kayaking around the Isle of White completing various levels of training including basic skills, safety techniques and instructor skills and concluding with the formal assessment to be become a qualified paddlesport coach.   She then had some time focused on Powerboats and on key skills such as Short Wave Radio and First aid at Sea.  Together with the opportunity for some keelboat sailing on a J80 and some dinghy fun in an RS500 when time allowed before completing her formal training and assessment as an RYA instructor.

Between practice sessions in Egypt

It was great to have her home for Christmas for a few days before she headed off to Egypt for three weeks to work on her Windsurfing skills before returning to Cowes for a week learning Coaching Techniques and her formal Windsurfer Instructor Qualifications.  Windsurfing at Cowes in February is not warm so the time in Egypt learning how to stay on top of the water was very worthwhile!

The formal teaching element of the Internship then concluded with an opportunity to do the formal land based day skipper training which covers skills such as navigation and chart work and then a week more keelboat sailing to gain the Instructing in Keelboats endorsement. Followed by a week of high Adrenaline twin trapeze Dart 16 sailing on some very windy days before also completing the multihull instructor endorsement.

i am loving work experience; finally instructing sailing!
hoping Greece will bring heat with the sun though,
unlike the solent. still quite picturesque though :)

Having completed the taught phase of the course Samantha is now loving the work experience which mixes opportunities to instruct some of the current courses at UKSA with other relevant work experience such as boat maintenance along with some career planning.  Daily tasks have varied from teaching beginners in Pico's to re-roping dinghies in the workshop or leading a group in Kayaks.  As an intern Sam already has her first formal Instructor job arranged with Neilson Holidays but will be looking for further work after the summer season in the Greek Islands.

Where next?

The work experience phase of UKSA Internship also allows a chance to do some flexible extra training and Sammi has now added an International Certificate of  Competence for powerboats, personal watercraft, yachts and dinghies to her portfolio and will also be completing her RYA Safety Boat and RYA Race Coach qualifications before heading home at the end of March.  We are very proud of our girl.