[Mee-n-Mac]

Originally Posted by Silver Duck

While I'm all for mandatory safety training, I respectfully disagree with your assessment of the on-line course vs. classroom training.

Knowledge is knowledge, however it's acquired. Anybody who really wants to learn the very, very basic info presented in the current boater certification material can easily do so using the on-line course. Boneheads aren't interested in being safe and courteous boaters and will do a "memory dump" as soon as they get their paper, however the material is presented! Or, at best, comply with the rules only when in sight of the MP and ignore them most of the time (which will not do much to alleviate the present situation, since the MP can't be everywhere at once!)

Neither presentation method can impart common courtesy and respect for others (which is learned in childhood or not at all), or the sound judgement and boat handling skills that are needed for safe boating and which come only through experience.

IMHO, what's sorely lacking lately is what I'll call a proper "skipper's attitude", where one accepts personal responsibility for safe operation. This attitude is what makes one want to have the proper safety gear, follow the nav rules, look out for the safety of nearby boats, learn the waters in which one will be boating, and above all else, think about the possible consequences of what one is about to do before doing it.

I learned it from my father (an ex-Coastie and Merchant Marine officer) as a boy, and have tried very hard to pass it on to my sons. Maybe the boating community can figure out a way to pass this attitude along to newbies through peer pressure. But no short course, no matter how it is presented, has a chance in heck of developing it in boneheads to whom it is entirely foreign.

Silver Duck

Good post ! I missed this one in the flurry of responses. As you said the question is how do "we" get "them" to buy into doing the "right thing" ? To some extent I believe that people will, and do, bone up for the boater's certificate and dump the knowledge later. It's my guess that a good instructor can make an impact of someone personally more often than an on-line course will but even this won't be effective anywhere near 100% of the time. I recall the very ineffective driving instruction videos (the blood, the gore) of my youth and constrast that with later instruction from Michelle at Bondurant's school. There are ways to get the message across but I'm not anything like a good teacher, who knows how to do it. Rules and fines have their place but I don't believe we'll punish our way into good boating. Perhaps when people get tired of driving like idiots on the roadways, they'll tire of the same on our waterways.