What is involved in getting a uspa coach rating?

[skittles_of_SDC 0]

The SIM just talks about what you can do with it but it doesn't say what you have to do to get it other than have a B-license and 100 jumps. Is there a written test. Do you have to demonstrate skills in the sky? Any info would be appreciated. Thanks.

[repcool 2]

You will need the IRM, Instructional Rating Manual, the SIM's big brother.

Good luck!


http://www.uspa.org/USPAShop/tabid/353/pid/89/2008-Instructional-Rating-Manual.aspx

[diablopilot 2]

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Is there a written test.

Yes. It's not difficult.

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Do you have to demonstrate skills in the sky?

Yes, the ability to fly relative, and to show that you can observe and remember what occurred on the jump.

You'll also have to show the ability to train/teach.

But the biggest thing you'll need to do in the coach course is learn. It should be rather intensive in it's training of you in teaching techniques.

And if you go for it, remember it's like any other rating in skydiving, a license to learn, to keep developing yourself through mentorship, and staying current on the lessons and improvements in the industry.

Good luck.

----------------------------------------------
You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[tonyhays 86]

Show up with your money.

“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”

[lauraliscious 0]

Find a coach course somewhere and take it! It's usually 2-3 days and the cost isn't too bad. Ask your DZ if they're going to have one any time soon, or you might need to travel to a different DZ if you have a certain timeframe in mind...

Enemiga Rodriguez, PMS #369, OrFun #25, Team Dirty Sanchez #116, Pelt Head #29, Muff #4091

[skittles_of_SDC 0]

thanks for all the advice guys.

[jasonRose 0]

You have to sell your soul to the devil!!

Some day I will have the best staff in the world!!!

[skittles_of_SDC 0]

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You have to sell your soul to the devil!!

I was told that was the PRO Rating.

[Gary73 8]

Here's what I post when I announce a Coach course:

Before attending the course, candidates must have:
current USPA membership,
at least a B License and at least 100 freefalls,
observed and assisted* with one complete First-Jump Course,
a Skydiver’s Information Manual that's less than 2 years old,
an Instructional Rating Manual that's less than 2 years old,
become familiar with the relevant SIM and IRM sections,
become familiar with all A-license (yellow) card items, and
completed the Coach Written Exam (in the IRM).

At the course, candidates will:
Attend a day or so of class and
conduct training sessions to teach several basic skydiving skills.

At or after the course, candidates will perform:
two or three** simulated ground preps,
two or three** coached jumps, and
one or two** debriefs of the coached jump(s).

Upon receiving the rating, Coaches can:
teach the general portion of the First-Jump Course unsupervised*** (with DZO approval),
make regular or coached jumps with students who have completed AFF,
verify (but not sign!?) A-license card qualifications, and
work toward qualifying for AFF and/or Tandem Instructor ratings.

The course fee is $75 plus slots for yourself and your Evaluator for two or three jumps**.

Start time: 9:00 AM, Friday,.

Be sure to bring your:
USPA membership card,
Most-recent logbook,
SIM,
IRM,
notepad and pen / pencil,
IRM pink card with FJC signed off,
completed Coach exam, and
course fee (cash or check)

* Level of assistance is whatever the candidate and Instructor are comfortable with.
** Last one only required if candidate gets an unsatisfactory grade on a previous one.
*** Additional observation and practice with an experienced Instructor are normal before a Coach is cleared to teach an FJC unsupervised.

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan

[Gawain 0]

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You have to sell your soul to the devil!!

I was told that was the PRO Rating.

No, for that, you give the devil back the money and he still keeps your soul.

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[skittles_of_SDC 0]

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...observed and assisted* with one complete First-Jump Course...

I assume you mean in teaching. Will most dropzones let people who don't have a coach rating yet assist?

[AllisonH 0]

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...observed and assisted* with one complete First-Jump Course...

I assume you mean in teaching. Will most dropzones let people who don't have a coach rating yet assist?

Yes, if they know you and you're assisting for the purpose of getting your coach rating. It's something you'll need to arrange with the DZ/instructor ahead of time.

[jasonRose 0]

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...observed and assisted* with one complete First-Jump Course...

I assume you mean in teaching. Will most dropzones let people who don't have a coach rating yet assist?

I would recomend sitting in a couple of FJC to get an idea on how others teach. Once the instructors see your interest I would be suprised if they didn't let you teach parts of the FJC under their supervision.

Some day I will have the best staff in the world!!!

[drdive 0]

I hear you are teaching lap dancing, Rosie?

Is that in the SIM - I looked and couldn't find it

"We saved your gear. Now you can sell it when you get out of the hospital and upsize!!" "K-Dub"

"

[mark 102]

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Here's what I post when I announce a Coach course:

Before attending the course, candidates must have:
current USPA membership,
at least a B License and at least 100 freefalls,
observed and assisted* with one complete First-Jump Course,

< snip >

Upon receiving the rating, Coaches can:
teach the general portion of the First-Jump Course unsupervised*** (with DZO approval),
* Level of assistance is whatever the candidate and Instructor are comfortable with.
** < snip >
*** Additional observation and practice with an experienced Instructor are normal before a Coach is cleared to teach an FJC unsupervised.

Define "normal."

The USPA web site lists a number of Coach Courses followed immediately by Instructor Rating Courses.

Mark

[Lawdog1 0]

And of course be able to identify the location of any ponds that may or may not lie below the deck you intend to jump off of.

[denete 2]

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Show up with your money.

Clarify please.

Are you saying that if you just show up and pay for a coach course, it's guaranteed that you'll get the rating?

Or, are you saying that if you show up with your money, you will have the skills necessary to be a safe and effective USPA rated coach?



Thanks in advance for your clarification.

- David

SCR #14809

"our attitude is the thing most capable of keeping us safe"
(look, grab, look, grab, peel, punch, punch, arch)

[Gary73 8]

Responding to several posts above:

Hopefully a Coach rating is rather more than a rubber-stamp rating, but that depends on the CD.

Used to be the Coach Course prereqs included teaching an FJC under supervision. Then they realized that that meant requiring the candidates to do something that they hadn't officially been trained to do yet. Now the candidates just observe, and if they and the Instructor are comfortable with it, they can teach portions under direct supervision. Then, in the course, they hopefully learn do do it even better. Even so, it's expected that recent Coach graduates will team teach the FJC a few times before going completely solo.

Sometimes multiple courses are scheduled with the same CD (but different candidates) so he only has to make one trip to the hosting DZ.

But yeah, some folks go straight from the Coach course into an AFF or Tandem course. Good idea? Probably not, since in most cases the Instructor course prereqs won't really have been met. Unfortunately those sometimes get rubber-stamped also.

Either way, the S&TA, DZO, and other Instructors are expected to provide a level of quality control for the instructional process. As with anything else, results vary.

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan

[tonyhays 86]

That's my cynical view of it. The attitude actually comes from being in one AFF course and filming two other AFF course directors. Of the three, only one of them impressed me with how much they challenge the candidate.

“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”

[denete 2]

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That's my cynical view of it. The attitude actually comes from being in one AFF course and filming two other AFF course directors. Of the three, only one of them impressed me with how much they challenge the candidate.

So maybe the better question to ask in a new discussion would be:

"What is involved in getting a course director rating?"

SCR #14809

"our attitude is the thing most capable of keeping us safe"
(look, grab, look, grab, peel, punch, punch, arch)

[indyz 1]

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"What is involved in getting a course director rating?"

Copied directly from the IRM:
1. A USPA Instructor or Instructor Examiner who has
been qualified as follows:
a. Has successfully completed the Advanced Instructor Course
b. meets all the requirements to qualify as a course evaluator
c. passes the USPA Coach written examination
d. Assists with at least one complete USPA Coach Rating Course
e. Provides headquarters with a written recommendation from the director of that USPA Coach Rating Course

2. Evaluators
a. USPA Instructor who has demonstrated to a USPA Coach Rating Course director the air skills required to pass the USPA Coach Rating Course
b. Appointed by the course director who has registered the course with USPA
c. Supervised by the course director, who is responsible for all evaluations.

[NickDG 23]

To understand the current "Coach" rating it will help to know its lineage.

Originally, from the mid-1950s to the early the 1980s, when the only "approved" training method was static line there were three main Instructional ratings.

In order of rank and responsibility they were:

-Jumpmaster (JM)
-Instructor (I)
-Instructor/Examiner (I/E)

Let's look at these ratings a bit closer. How you went about attaining these ratings were about the same for the first two. But the I/E rating was a bit different. It's also worth noting skydiving borrowed heavily from aviation and the military for these titles.

Being a JM was the entry level Instructor rating. You needed 200 jumps and a "C' license when I applied in 1980. (There was a time, in the early days of the sport, and before the proliferation of commercial drop zones, when attaining a "C" license automatically made you an Instructor) With a JM rating you could brief students for upcoming jumps, dress them, supervise them in the aircraft, and dispatch them via static line. Pretty much everything except teach a first jump class. An Instructor had to be on the DZ, as like now, all phases of student training had to be under their direct supervision. JMs were also allowed, and encouraged to teach and assist in multiple first jump courses (FJCs). The one plum of being a JM was once a student got to doing 30 seconds delays from 7500-feet JMs where allowed to jump with them. This was the famous "cherry dive" where you'd go and dock on the student for their first ever two-way. And those jumps were a lot of fun. And these and the later jumps you made with static line students were training us for something no one knew about yet, AFF.

Besides the prerequisites for the JM rating you also needed to attend a Jumpmaster Certification Course (JCC). These were run by any Instructor and all you had to do was let USPA your where doing one and who was taking it. And this is where sometimes things went off the rails.

The JCCs were typically one day affairs and some where terrific jam packed sessions on all phases of proper Jumpamastering. But some others were little better than several guys sitting around a table drinking beer and telling jump stories for an hour or two. Yet, we got away with that in those early days as jumpers in general were a little more tuned into the mechanics of how their gear worked and experienced jumpers in the plane were exposed to the job of Jumpmaster as all the action took place in the door right in front of them. Also in those days as students they spent sometimes three times as many jumps, or more, with a JM than they do now before being cut loose from supervision. Also in these JCCs you actually went up in the aircraft and put out your classmates on static line gear or you simulated it with dummy static lines. When I conducted JCCs I always made them do real static line jumps on real student gear. My thinking was if they didn't feel comfortable doing that how could they ask their students to do it?

And on a purely whimsical note "Jumpmaster" was the coolest sounding title there was in skydiving and I was very sad when USPA dropped it.

The Instructor rating worked about the same except you had to be a current JM and have held that rating for two years. You then attended an Instructor Certification Course (ICC). And again some of these where educational fests and some where jokes depending on who ran them. One big problem JCCs and ICCs had in common was the lack of attention paid to good teaching techniques. You usually got the nuts and bolts but not how to impart that information to students. On the other hand someone who had a JM rating for two or more years, and who was interested in becoming a Instructor, usually had a lot of time in the classroom teaching FJCs. And many could do the entire thing with no problem.

Neither of these courses where the pass or fail type. Pretty much everyone who attended and had their paperwork in order passed. Where we did have some discretion, at least on the JCC level, was with whom you let attend your courses. If someone applied but you knew them to be unreliable, scary, or dangerous it was a simple matter to say, sorry, all the slots are taken. But it didn’t prevent these types from going out of town. And it always bugged me when other Instructors took in people they didn't know. I always thought USPA should have made that some kind of rule. And I know there could be personality conflicts in that, but USPA could have devised some method of redress in those cases.

Now a short note on the I/E rating: Anyone who put in for this one was surprised at the depth of general knowledge required to pass the extensive written test. While you needed all the other ratings you also needed a working knowledge on rigging, airplane stuff, weather, demos, night jumps water jumps, FAA rules, and everything else under the drop zone sun. I/Es were meant to be the last word on everything in the field. But I found most of them knew a little about everything, but were masters of nothing. It's was nice to be able say you were an I/E but that was about it, and it was an otherwise useless rating.

Then in 1981-82 USPA rolled out the AFF program and to their credit they put a lot of thought into it. It was, after all, a very radical departure in student training but it got off to a good start. I was only a Jumpmaster at that time (1982) and you needed to be a static line JM or Instructor to take the AFF Certification Course (ACC). Nowadays it's just called an AFF Cert Course as it's the only real certification course left, but it shocked most of us who took it in the early days. The way it worked is if you came into the AFF Cert Course as a Static Line Jumpmaster, and you passed it, you left as an AFF Jumpmaster. Then once you took an ICC you automatically became both a Static Line and AFF Instructor. If you came into the AFF Cert Course as a Static Line Instructor, and you passed, you left as an AFF Instructor. The perquisites in the those days for the AFF Cert Course, besides a JM or I rating, was 4 hours of freefall. (They since raised this to six hours).

There were no real classrooms at Perris when I took the AFF Cert Course there, one of the first few courses every conducted. But the USPA course directors that came in from Headquarters arranged to have a spanking new air conditioned motor home brought in and there I sat. I looked around and here were all the big guns from both Elsinore and Perris and I was most likely the least experienced of the bunch. And it was then I looked up to see Paul Sitter and Mike Johnston from USPA and got the news that sent chills down my spine. "Gentlemen (there actually weren't any woman in the room) this course is not a gimmie! The AFF rating must be earned and more than half of you in here now won't make it." There was some audible grumbling and outright guffaws from the big guns, guys who'd been Static Line Instructors for many years. As for myself I figured I was doomed.

The original concept for AFF was first tried by Bob Sinclair in the 1960s. He called them harness hold jumps. And he'd jump single JM fashion with his first jump students. He attached a lanyard to his student's main ripcord to ensure if somehow they did get away from him they weren't going anywhere but under a canopy. He did a lot of these jumps with celebrities in the Hollywood area and the most well known was his jump with Johnny Carson. To the rest of the sport and to PCA (what they were before USPA) Bob Sinclair was a certified wacko. But like USPA has done many times in the past, yesterday's wacko became today's visionary.

So we began our week long (another new concept to us) AFF Certification Course. Initially rather than being much on how to do AFF they had to spend a lot of time explaining to us just what the heck AFF really was. And what they were trying to accomplish with it. The course directors were more like salesman and there was a bit of resistance from the big guns. On our breaks I heard more than few saying, "This God damn thing will never work, they are going to be bouncing students left and right."

I was lucky though in one area. I was young enough not to be that firmly entrenched in the old ways and I was excited as hell about the whole thing. Then, like now, we were free to pair up for the initial two Jumpmaster certification dives. But that's where I had my first problem. I was from the San Diego area. And to the jumpers at Elsinore and Perris, in the skydiving sense, that was like being from another country. A third world country. So nobody wanted to jump with me. Even when I asked someone I got a bunch of, "Who the fuck are you(s)?"

But my revenge was watching the mighty fall one after another. And more than a few stormed out of the course altogether after their first few dives going, "Fucking zero, how the hell do I get a fucking zero, this is all fucking bullshit!"

I was spending the week in my car in the Perris parking lot and every night I had my flashlight out devouring every word in the course materials. Not jumping right away also allowed me to learn where people were making their mistakes. Finally, on about the third day, and running out of candidates someone had to take me with them on a dive. And it was Bob Celaya from California City. I'd never met him although years later we'd become good friends and I'd work for him. All I knew is he was another big gun. The thing about these two jumpmaster jumps is while one candidate's performance isn't supposed to affect the other, at some level there's no way to get around the fact your fates are intertwined. And Bob, who was struggling like everyone else in the course, only said one thing to me before we went up. "Don’t fuck this up, kid."

And we both landed with big fat zeros. But only because we busted the hard deck yet the rest of the dive wasn't that bad. That's when Bob said, "Okay kid, it's you and me from here on in." We worked on our timing, divvied up who was responsible for what, and while we were deviating from the syllabus we were just trying to beat the course anyway we could. Then we started landing with twos and threes and we even both got a four on one dive. When we moved onto the level four dives we both did okay and both of us wound up passing the course. Every since that day Bob and I always had that, "we went through a war together" thing going.

In the early days not every DZ had an AFF program right away. They either didn’t have the rated staff or the gear. Lots of DZ were still putting students out on gut gear and that wasn't very conducive to AFF. However I did a few of those early on. And with gut gear if you were on Main-side, you were really also Reserve-side too.

So AFF and Static Line ran concurrently until the AFF program began to fully ramp up. And then slowly Static Line began to fall by the wayside. So now USPA had a problem. They had to start certifying their AFF rating holders basically from scratch. Now people sitting their AFF cert courses had never handled a student skydiver in any form in their lives. Also around this time "students" changed from merely being people trying to break into the world of skydiving to people who were now "customers" and "clients." I'm not saying that before this time we didn’t care if they made it or not, but the onus was on them to make the grade and not on us to baby them through it. But now that attitude was beginning to change and as more DZ came into existence "service" started to become important to differentiate one from the another. And the era of a student being a nobody until they proved themselves was officially over.

USPA correctly figured actual teaching skills, not just knowing all there was to know about skydiving, was important so the AFF Cert Courses began to contain lessons on that subject. They had to as everyone who passed a course came out an Instructor right off the bat and were free to teach FJCs. In the early cert courses it was all about air skills, but now ground skills were getting more of an equal billing. Eventually USPA settled into having a small group of AFF course directors, usually three, for the entire country, and things hummed along quite nicely. I worked my way up to being an evaluator in some of these courses after I gained the trust of one of the course directors. And it was then I found my love of teaching the teachers.

But I also began to see problems with how we were doing things. The AFF certification course, at first, was just that. It wasn't really supposed to be a teaching course. As candidates you were supposed to show up prepared and ready to be certified. But they weren't doing that and the pass/fail rate was dismal. I'd even saw a course or two were nobody passed. Then experienced AFF Instructors began to advertise formal pre-courses and things got a little better, and I did conduct those myself but even that, in my mind, wasn't the total answer.

Then I got real excited when I heard Jay Stokes was going to start something called "Certification Unlimited" a for real boot camp for new skydiving Instructors. A place where you'd go for a few weeks to eat, sleep, and shit skydiving instruction. I even got with Jay and did some work with him and his prototype "student instructors" when he was first hashing it all out. This, I thought, was the answer to all our problems. But USPA wasn't buying. I even had one USPA official tell me I was out of my mind. And then almost in a distinct effort to make things worse they then yanked the rug out from under AFF altogether. They dropped the three person AFF course director program, which kept things in check and all on the same page, and threw it open to basically anyone with an AFF rating. We were now back to the old JCCs. Some AFF cert courses would be up to snuff, and some could be worthless . . .

During the course of all this the USPA, knowing there were issues, started slapping band aids on things. The first one was the Basic Instructor Course (BIC) and that only lasted a few years. Then they came out with the "Coach" rating. That one never sat well with me because as important as primary skydiving students are, the next level up, AFF graduate to "A" license level is just as and maybe even more important. At that point, because they can now absorb more, they need something better than a baby sitter. If anything the "coach" rating should be reserved for 30-year skydiving greybeards who enjoy jumping with newbies and who could actually impart some wisdom instead of just taking all that knowledge to their graves. But it's not place for "student Instructors" to practice their skills.

A fix, I believe, is this . . .

Bring back the Jumpmaster rating. Then allow "certain" Instructors to bring these Jumpmasters under their wings in more of a mentor style relationship. They'd stay together like butter and toast all though every phrase of student training including, when deemed ready, actually going reserve-side on real AFF two JM dives. This mentor relationship would be set at a minimum time, but no maximum. Your mentor would cut you lose only when they were satisfied you were ready. We'd have to keep in check who actually is allowed to do this, and USPA has always shown a lack in that, but I know for a fact there are hundreds of experienced Instructors in the field who could do this. Otherwise, what happens? We'll also have a whole generation of Instructor veterans taking what they know to their graves. And that's a big waste.

I know with all this, I'll sound like a wacko to some of you, but hey, someday I may be a visionary . . . !

NickD

[skittles_of_SDC 0]

Thanks Nick, I always love your posts. It's cool to hear about things the way they were in the early days of the sport.

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A fix, I believe, is this . . .

Bring back the Jumpmaster rating. Then allow "certain" Instructors to bring these Jumpmasters under their wings in more of a mentor style relationship. They'd stay together like butter and toast all though every phrase of student training including, when deemed ready, actually going reserve-side on real AFF two JM dives. This mentor relationship would be set at a minimum time, but no maximum. Your mentor would cut you lose only when they were satisfied you were ready. We'd have to keep in check who actually is allowed to do this, and USPA has always shown a lack in that, but I know for a fact there are hundreds of experienced Instructors in the field who could do this. Otherwise, what happens? We'll also have a whole generation of Instructor veterans taking what they know to their graves. And that's a big waste.

I know with all this, I'll sound like a wacko to some of you, but hey, someday I may be a visionary . . . !

NickD

That sounds very reasonable to me. The only thing I wonder about is this: no doubt there are some instructors who would not mind and some who would even enjoy taking a "JM" or "Coach" under their wing and spend time with them everyday for who knows how long teaching them stuff, but would there be enough of the type of Instructors who actually want to do this type of thing? Or do you restrict the JM's who are allowed to go through the program?

Btw, if they ever switch to this type of program I call you as my Instructor.

[diablopilot 2]

It's a responsibility everyone who takes on the "Instructor" title, should feel.

Coaches were always intended to work under the supervision of Instructors, unfortunately there are CD's that are not impressing this upon their candidates.

As an instructor it's my responsibility to monitor and train the coaches who are working with MY students. If I'm going to sign off on a license requirement, you bet I'm going to ensure that the coaches working with the students are developing in the right manner.

I've been asked, as an Instructor, to sign off on some of the pre-course requirements for people going to Instructional Rating courses and every time I ask myself, "Do I think they are really ready, would I be ok working on the other side of a student with this person, or send my mother up on a tandem with them."

If the answer is yes, then I sign, if not, I'll explain why.

----------------------------------------------
You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[NickDG 23]

>>If the answer is yes, then I sign, if not, I'll explain why.
But down here in So Cal we are lousy with Instructors. And not all of them are as thoughtful as you. So a fellow you or I might not sign for can go Instructor shopping easily enough . . .

NickD