Introducing Online Courses

One of the Association’s best accomplishments has been our in-person, interactive educational offerings. This has allowed not only collaboration among participants, but also an opportunity to have direct one-on-one with our seminar leaders. The COVID-19 Pandemic has caused us to rethink how we can still meet the Association’s goals in the midst of travel restrictions, health concerns, and time constraints.

Our Education Committee has long-favored in-person program delivery due to the valuable interaction that occurs between students. However, in the face of an uncertain future, we have decided to launch online course delivery in order to ensure that our programs are accessible to students with concerns related to the pandemic and/or under travel restrictions.

Our first offerings in this new format will be our Maritime Management Seminars, both the coastal and inland seminars (MPM/IMPM). These 16-hour programs are well-suited to online delivery. We will be using Zoom for the courses, and our first offerings are scheduled for 17-21 August and 21-25 September. We will be announcing more details on the courses later this month.

The courses will be delivered in four, 3.5 hour sessions over the course of a week (with breaks in the middle of each session). Materials will be shipped to participants in advance of the course, and certificates will be shipped after satisfactory completion of the four sessions. We will deliver the same content and certification, as well as membership and its privileges remain the same.

Our hope is to continue to deliver high-quality in person courses when they can be safely and successfully held. To that end, in order to reduce travel requirements, we are training and certifying new faculty in various regions of the country to do small, regional seminars. We are currently developing new faculty in Texas, the Southeast US, and the Mid-Atlantic US. Prospective instructors go through a rigorous training and certification process in order to preserve our strict quality standards. We held our first course with a regional instructor in June 2020, and it was a success.

The online MPM/IMPM may afford an opportunity for students to upgrade to an Accredited Maritime Port Executive certification (AMPE). Students taking the MPM or IMPM who have previously completed the MPE or IMPE may be eligible to receive the AMPE certification, or apply the 16 hours of training towards maintaining their AMPE. Contact us for more information on getting or maintaining an AMPE.

Our goal, as ever, is the professional development and certification of our industry’s operators and managers, and we are confident that adding online course delivery will be an effective means of providing professional development while keeping our students and faculty safe. We look forward to having you join us in one of our upcoming programs, whether in person or remotely.

Our best wishes for the summer.