International Sail and Power Academy (ISPA) offer a complete program for both power boating and sailing instruction. They provide boating associations, schools, instructors and students with Sailing and Power boating instruction programs, certification and materials. It’s a turnkey operation and one of the most respected sources of boating safety and instruction worldwide.
The courses and curriculum are focused on both Shore-based training as well as on the water ‘practical’ training.The kind folks at ISPA sent me the range of books including the Safe Boating workbook, Competent Crew – Sail, Competent Crew – Power and Coastal Navigation for review.
The books themselves are impressive. They are chock full of essential information that is presented in a clean digestible format with helpful images and photos that illustrate the points being discussed. The course materials are continually updated with current information and are improved on an ongoing basis.
I found the hands on ‘how to’ style of these books to emphasis practical application of knowledge (vs. pure theory). Finally, the books are comprehensive but are laid out in a modular format and the points are succinctly made. The content and format of these books are well thought through out to help ensure that people learn.
The ISPA Logbook outlines the instructional programs from basic safety and Day Skipper through Yacht-master Ocean. In each page of the Logbook, there are clear and precise standards that the student must understand to the instructor’s satisfaction before the student can be certified.Upon completion of the workbook modules (which must be completed to achieve certification), the students do a ‘practical’ session on the water with the instructor. If students choose to only get an ASHORE based certification, they can do so with an online exam administered by ISPA.
Many students complete the Competent Crew as well as Day Skipper and Navigation at the same time. International Sail & Power Academy suggests a minimum of a 4 day and 3 night ‘cruise and learn’ type of process for beginning level, but if these three are combine, a 6 day course is suggested. At the end of every day, instructors sit with each of the students and go thru the logbook pages and check off what has been successfully completed and what has not. This enables the student to carry their logbook from instructor to instructor should they take different classes with different instructors. At the end of a course, the instructor checks off the Practical and Shore-based components on the certification page of the logbooks.
Students then send their logbooks back to ISPA (a process currently under review by ISPA) and they adhere the International Certificate of Competency sticker and the Shore-based component sticker and return the book to the student as proof of certification. The logbooks are used by students in demonstrating their competency to insurance companies, charter companies and sailing schools.If you are an individual looking to select a course where you will actually learn, the ISPA courses, books and materials are highly recommended.
