Craig: At some risk of making the thread boring: Rob: Never. Craig: Now, now.... Rob: I thought that was funny! No? Craig: The only game in town... actually. Rob: There are more great coaches unaffiliated with the BCU than affiliated. Craig:I thought we were talking about "us". And we're certainly on the radar screen of the public; often as a nutty fringe group. It's fertile ground for an organization to come up with a panoply of standards and set itself up as the arbiter of skills. Politicians love paper solutions (have I said that before?) and this one is a doozy. Rob: Are we not making backpacks and outdoor products in Vietnam. As far as I can tell, the Domino Theory of Kayaker Control Mechanisms is not happening. Craig: But you were a member of BCU... and if you are no longer a member then your certification as a coach is no longer valid. Will you have to re-certify if you need that certification? Rob: I was never a coach. I took a training once, at the time I was Coach 2 T (as in Trainee), were I ever needed to coach, say on a day trip, I wanted the ability to teach a simple construct. Nothing more. For simple star tests, you need not be a member. My star tests are still valid, membership or not, despite the recent changes to the BCU/UKCC scheme. Craig: From what I can see *every* level requires an "assessment" (e.g.: test). You pay for the clinic to teach you how to pass the test and then you pay for the test. If you fail the test they tell you what you failed on and then you retake the clinic and retake the test. Paying, again, for both. I'm not sure why they can't just certify you within the clinic. Oh, wait... I guess I am sure, after all. Rob: If you are that motivated you just retake the assessment. In the UK, the system has evolved around the club system and the structure can be alot less formal than it is here. I do think some things are lost in translation. If you want to get into *fluoridated water territory* I pay the ACA 60 bucks a year for a family membership (? or something like that) because my club requires ACA insurance for pools, trip participation or trip leadership. Let's say I had an old 4* award in the BCU and wanted to take a 5* course. The recent changes to the BCU/UKCC might have me retake the newly enhanced 4*, but that is now a different thing. It is up to the paying customer whether they want to do that or not and the success of the scheme will be based on whether they actually do. I'm not that with it these days, so I'm just looking at it from outside just like you are. Craig: You seem to be confused in that I'm stating that all the problems I foresee are here now. I'm not saying that. But what I am saying is that it won't take long for the underwriters involved with the business aspect of kayaking to realize that BCU accreditation is a way to show - on paper at least - that the operation they are insuring is insurable. This starts with the "coaches" (instructors). It's not likely to end there. Rob: There are some business aspects of kayaking, insuring and what not, but really, what are these manifesting themselves in the simple ability to plop your boat down in a state park and disappear beyond a headland? Your fears are simply not reality. I can go to a couple of stores in the Puget Sound and demo a boat to see if I like it, I can demo a whitwater or sea boat for a day, no problem. How many boats did you demo at the recent West Coast Sea Kayak Symposium? If I wanted to be a raft guide I'm pretty sure I'd have to go to a raft guide school before an outfitter would show me. I don't even know if there is a British Raft Guide Union or not, or if I would even call them. Craig: Again, you seem to think that what the BCU is today is what it will be tomorrow. And while kayaking may be "low viz" to the public at large we are not low viz to the insurance industry nor to the politicians trying to come up with "solutions" to public safety that will get them re-elected. Rob: Reelected? Ibve only come across a few lines in my life insurance that wonbt cover ^mountaineeringb , no suggestion of whitewater boating, or sea kayaking. There are those lily livered places that donbt cover the aforementioned but you have to look for it. And you are worried about the BCU? Craig: This is exactly why so many kayakers are not in favor of BCU standards. Some of us just want to paddle and are not interested in passing tests. The BCU looks like a looming "authority" to us and it makes us uncomfortable. Rob: Ask yourself this, why is the ACA so impotent in this discussion? I'm even a member and yet I've never taken a course from them. I have from ACA trained instructors. I have assisted ACA instructors in nooby trainings in ACA insured events. Yet, you fear the BCU? I make a family membership payment once a year to them and one to my club. They are so *with it*, the ACA, that I might even get my updated card back in 2 or 3 months after payment. Ya, I really fear these guys. They might mess up kayaking by making themselves an authority or something. I do it because that is the current structure of my club. I made that analysis that the 100 bucks a year total for my wife and I going to the ACA and WA Kayak club was worth it to gain the benefit of cheap trainings that might be offered, day trips in places I've not been, new people to paddle with, etc. Usually, having had a curriculum based education gets you roped into basic education for new paddlers. They fed me at a couple of these events but that was about it. Happy to help out on occasion. Craig: This is a red herring argument. Schools don't have to be "rich" to make a living. And if they all have to pony up to become BCU certified clinics (and yes, I know there is no such thing - yet) they might even make less. Rob: The BCU-MIC will have you washing their landing craft, that I assure you. : ) Craig:The Puget Sound area must have at least 15 businesses engaged in training paddlers. They are all pretty much in competition with each other, wouldn't you think? If one or two of them could somehow confince new paddlers that BCU certification was important enough to pay extra they might be in a better competitive position that the others. Or maybe, within 5 or 10 years, they'd all have to be BCU certified just to stay in business. Some of us worry about this. Rob: Of the BCU world, Body Boat Blade is the primary school. They have trained lots of paddlers in some ways that go on to coach really inexpensive courses for the Washington Kayak Club. Really cheap, as in even a kayaker thinks they are cheap. Kayak Academy is equally reknowned, for good reason, but not a BCU affiliated. Who else? Does Nigel Foster teach BCU clinics or Nigel Foster clinics? Every one I've seen is an Nigel Foster clinic. This is a pretty thin branch to be making predictions of sport bureaucratization upon. Craig:Go ask George Gronseth how much he has to pay each year for liability insurance for his business, The Kayak Academy, and whether or not a huge increase might put him out of the business. Are you sure you're paying attention here? Rob: This has nothing to do with the BCU, whatsoever. This is an insurance risk calculation. Tell your insurer that you are going to summit Denali this year. Does the sport of mountaineering still go on? Craig: Once again... I am not addressing the status quo at the moment. I am addressing what many of us feel is in the future. I agree that you do not need anything more than, "oh ya... I can paddle" to rent a kayak. I think that this is about to change. Rob: Businesses should decide that in close consultation with their insurers and attorneys. I'm pretty sure the BCU is 5,000 miles away from this, as we speak. After Denali, tell your insurer it's on to Everest! Craig: Last I looked the insurance industry was mostly Republican. The BCU is not on anyone's radar except for those of us engaged in kayaking at the moment. This could change and seriously affect the way we paddle. Read some of Paul's and Peter's posts if you don't think that well-meaning people with political power can change the way you kayak. Rob: Really? Most people I paddle with have had or still have an ACA card, but little else to do with the organization. Some coach as volunteers once in awhile. The BCU is a minority, with an even lower minority of active coaches in my circles. They are pretty good at staying out of the way, based on my experience. Craig:Do you really think that once there are standards no one will think to enforce them? There are areas of Australia where you cannot paddle more than 2nm off the coast right now. If the BCU sets itself up as the arbiter of standards in kayaking you can bet your bippy some politician will take notice. Especially if someone who decided to paddle their SOT from Seattle to Dutch Harbor disappears and their Mom starts a campaign to "make kayaking safer". Perhaps you'd need that BCU cert to paddle more than 2nm from shore off NSW. Rob: People die every year in kayaking. People die in their jeans and cotton sweatshirts in their canoes. People die every year in rafting accidents. My state senator has never once grabbed me by the shoulder and said *Son, we are going to change the way you kayak.* Australia is not America. Next time you want to demo a new boat, go to the outfitter and ask. This hasn't changed. Craig:You've displayed your share of curmudgeonry, yourself, you know. :) Rob: back in the day they used to call it a smart alleck. : ) Craig: The US government is not asking the BCU to intervene; but the BCU is in here already. Some of us think that it might not be all that great. And I think I've put forward enough to make our concerns real not imagined. Rob: I disagree, based on all the points I've countered yours with. Craig: Not that none of us think that training is bad. Ten years ago almost no sea kayakers who had not been w/w kayakers could roll. I think that has changed. Five years ago most sea kayakers didn't even have drysuits; that, too, has changed. But training has many forms not just one form and BCU looks like it would like nothing better than to have just one form. Rob: The BCU is not monolithic. It has a diversity of opinion as varied as any organization gets. What do you base your opinion on? As far as sea kayakers and progression goes I see an improvement in equipment and attitudes all over the place. Why do you think that is, Craig? Do you see any connection to a curriculum based scheme such as ACA, BCU or CRCA and the generally speaking, higher level of performance of today vs 10 years ago? And yet nobody's state senator has yet grabbed them by the shoulder and said, *Son, we are going to change the way you kayak.* The typical paddler in sea kayaking sees all the pretty boats, has a friend that got them into it and takes a intro course at a shop. If they stay with it they might join the club. Many just hang in the periphery and pay a little attention to an internet group and paddle on Saturdays. Some take a clinic. Sometimes that puts them in contact with these dreaded BCU and ACA coaches. In our club, most are volunteers who spent after tax money on clinics to be better prepared to do this once in awhile. The only way they will actually go after the sport is to tax your boat as they are doing in OR and ID. In WA, they screwed that up by having you buy a permit for your car at the Dept of Natural Resource put ins on rivers and the sound. Now they would have a much harder time going back to your boat. Politicians have no idea about the BCU, they do see revenue in the form of permits and tax stamps but that is a completely different thing. Craig: I'd rather not see that. Can you not see at least a little sense in this attitude? Rob: For your argument to succeed, you would have to have some valid claim that the ACA rep and the BCU rep had mined the participation rosters of their state clubs and headed for the state assembly house and gone to work. Got any? Show me something that the volunteer coach at the pool session teaching the nooby how to roll is secretly grooming them for secret rites in an all pervasive BCU, soon to open an affiliate in the state capitol. Cheers, Rob G = *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Wed Oct 21 2009 - 10:46:56 PDT
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