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Starpath School of Navigation |
About Starpath School of Navigation |
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The school facilities are located in Seattle's historic
Scandinavian community of Ballard, about halfway between the Government Locks and the Shilshole Bay Marina (see How to get here). Classroom, home study, and private instruction is offered in all areas of marine navigation and related subjects. The school has had more than 25,000 students since 1977. The instructors are practicing navigators with years of teaching experience and thousands of miles of sea time. Most sailors in the Northwest and thousands around the world know of the school and its fine reputation for high quality instruction and teaching materials.
Besides actual instruction in navigation and weather, we produce and publish books and software on navigation and related topics. David Burch is the Director of the school and author of much of the course materials used at the school. Mark Burch is Vice President of Starpath Corporation. He coordinates marketing and sales. Classroom instructors in coastal and celestial have included Bruce Minturn, Bob Levy, Will Lesh, Michael Gropp, Debra Rigas, David Burch, Pamela Hom, and Robert Reeder. Marine weather has been taught by NOAA Cmdr. Ken Lilly, Jr. (ret.), Pam Hayes, and David Burch. See also our list of Online Instructors. In the past we offered our full set of classroom courses as often as four times a year, sometimes with concurrent courses going on. Recently we have concentrated more on the home study courses and software development. We teach classroom courses less often, and only one course at a time. We also conduct special seminars and present public talks throughout the year. If you are looking for help on a particular subject, find out How Starpath Can Help You Meet Your Training Goals. We exhibit our products at several Boat Shows around the country throughout the year. If you happen to be near one of these, please stop in to say hello. |
| About our Home Study Courses |
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The same materials we use in our classroom courses are available for home study. Learn at home or underway with these comprehensive packages for coastwise and ocean navigation, and marine weather developed from experience with thousands of students during the past 20 some years. With so much help, we have learned most of the questions that arise and answer them in the texts. Each of the many exercises has outlined or detailed solutions provided.
Each course includes the invitation to use phone, fax, or e-mail to contact the school with questions as you work through the materials. You may call with specific questions about the text or practice problems or with general questions on navigation or related matters. Registration in any of our courses is your ticket to this unique source of personal consultation on navigational matters. How you work the courses: Each course includes the detailed syllabus used in our classroom courses. It breaks the materials up into some 8 sections, each having assigned reading throughout the materials along with assigned practice problems. Do the reading assigned, work the problems, and check your answers with those provided. If questions arise at any point in the process, give us a call — or check the tech support section on the individual courses. Errata, notes, and supplements are posted there. We can either answer the question then or direct you to where it is covered in the materials. Certification of Course Completion: We offer several ways to document your course completion and achievements. The certificates provide written record of your work. They are recognized by bare-boat charter companies and insurance companies that offer discounts based upon educational courses. Certificates of this type can be especially valuable for operations in some foreign countries which require documentation to authorize boat operations by any crew other than the declared master of the vessel. We offer our own certification as well as preparation for certification tests from any other agency. Please see certification details.
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| About our books and other products |
| Most of the books and software we sell are products of Starpath. Other products are ones that we recommend because they supplement our course materials in some way and are thus called for often enough that we stock them. In short, we only carry products that we specifically recommend in our courses and about which we are thoroughly familiar. |
| Starpath in the News |
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Articles about David Burch and Starpath can be read here. Dockside Magazine Sunset Magazine Metropolitan Living |
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