KristoriaBlack wrote:Yeah, that is exactly what got me hesitant about the WRF course taught by that group. They told me that because the class sizes are so small, 1:1 or 1:2 that they can get the 80 hour course taught in 50 hours.
Does that sound reasonable? To anyone who's taken the course is there a lot of time wasted because of the large group sizes? And I heard the WFR is pretty intense, is it a good idea to cram the 80 hour course into 5 days?
I remember in highschool I went to a private school for my grade 13 calculus credit that offered to give me the credit at an accelarated pace. I got the credit but the next year I took calculus as a required course in undergrad and flunked out horribly. I don't want the same thing to happen should my skills ever be needed, on the other hand the course is offered quite close to home.
Well, I guess we might have paired as much as 4-8 hours off and we had a smaller class with a good instructor/student ratio but 72 down to 50 is so much that they must be skimping on something. I don't know the place you posted so this isn't a knock on them but I can't see how you can cram the amount of material we covered down to a five day course. NOLS is sort of the standard (although I didn't do it with them) and they run an 80 hour course
http://www.nols.edu/wmi/courses/wildfir ... nder.shtml Wildmed offers a 5 day course with 25 hours of pre study for a total of 70 recorded
hourshttp://www.wildmed.com/outdoor-pro ... 5-day.html , the place I did it required 72
http://www.wildernessmedicine.com/Class ... fault.aspx.
Maybe your place also requires prior study and credits you for 64+ hours when completed? If so that is probably fine, a lot of it is DIY study.
I'd say the biggest concern you have is that it is tough to recert wfr courses in general and you will not want to do the whole thing ever again. I'm driving 6 hours each way and spending three nights at a hotel for my recert because I never want to put the time and money into the full course again. Practically speaking you probably want to keep the cert once you get it and 50 hours probably won't cut it other places. So, my advice would be, as annoying as finding and taking these courses can be, to make sure you can recert it. If you aren't likely to move anytime soon and the place you are getting it from has been around long enough then consider it an option. If you find yourself elsewhere needing to recert through a different agency proceed with caution.
It is well worth doing though and I've never understood why more places don't make it modular so that more people can go through it.