The disadvantages of utilising a flexible delivery approach can be summarised as follows:
・requires highly skilled teaching staff to be effective;
・organisational needs may reduce the benefits of flexible delivery;
・costs to providers may be increased;
・interaction between student/teacher, and student/student may be reduced;
・access to support material may be reduced.
Clearly for users and providers alike the challenge is to, firstly, be aware of both the advantages and disadvantages of a flexible delivery approach to education and training and, secondly, to work together to provide a valid and reliable learning experience to achieve the desired outcomes.
Quality
STCW 95 should be all about improving the competence of seafarers which, by default is also about improving the quality of MET institutions and the marine administrations responsible for issuing Certificates of Competency. If a MET institution is a quality institution (not necessarily quality assured) then it will have:
- educationally valid courses (approved and audited by a competent education authority);
- qualified staff (both technical and teacher trained);
- good facilities and equipment (suitable for the task, maintained, upgraded/replaced regularly);
- standards, procedures etc for anything affecting core business (valid, documented, accessible, USED, maintained for quality control, audited and improved);
- external audit/accreditation (independent verification of standards of courses, teachers, teaching equipment, facilities, processes/procedures);
- quality graduates (competent, employable, reputable, professional).
If a MET institution genuinely meets these criteria then STCW 95 has virtually no effect on the operation of the institution. For example, at AMC the only real effect has been to rewrite our course documentation to match the competencies required by STCW 95, revise some subject time allocations and carefully review how we can better assess the competence of our students. Our training/education already exceeded the requirements of STCW 95 and has done so since the inception of AMC in 1979.
On the other hand if a MET institution does not meet these criteria then STCW 95 should be along, loud wake up call to lift performance or be forced out of the business of MET. Whether marine administrations have the skills, will or backbone to ensure non-performing MET institutions are forced from the scene is, of course, also a matter of debate, as is the real value of the so called IMO 'white list'.
Quality graduates are a marketable product and this will increasingly become the case. It is incumbent on all of us to provide MET that is of a standard to meet the needs of our customers.
