Career Path Advice

So I made a thread about 2 weeks ago but it was mod-edited and i could not post replies in it for some reason. In anycase things have changed, here is my current postion:

Im a us citizen.
Ive done a stcw course approved by the mca at a maritime college in trinidad & tobago, for 3rd mate unlimited. (i have dual citizenship & tertiary education is free for nationals)
Ive passed all the courses except the celestial navigation. I can redo the course but the only offered time is in January next year.

At this point I have a year of free time so i figure it would be best to get some seatime (esp. as after the courses are completed, im going to be sent off as a cadet anyway for seatime) to jumpstart my seagoing career.

Im considering heading to the us to get a twic & mmc and try to get a job/experience.
I have 2 questions.

  1. I can do the stcw BST here. it is mca accredited but is that also accepted by the uscg?

and

  1. Is it advisable to go this route? any better suggestions?

thanks a lot guys.

If you want to sail on your US mmc, the Trini BST doesn’t count for anything. You have to go to a USCG Approved BST course. Pick one license or the other nothing foreign is recognised towards American licensing. You’re already pretty much complete with the Trinidad license so just go with that. Otherwise if you really want a US license you should consider going to a US maritime Academy. You’ll have to retake all the courses you probably already took though.

Im not doing a Trini license. Think of it as an overseas uk academy. The head of the navigation dept is run by a guy thats on the mca board…so my license would be uk.

in anycase, reason i asked is i hoped at the very least the bst should be standard for both mca & uscg. also the pay would be much better than trying to get work on a local vessel around here.

Not sure what I should do for a year though…

Im not doing a Trini license. Think of it as an overseas uk academy. The head of the navigation dept is run by a guy thats on the mca board…so my license would be uk.

in anycase, reason i asked is i hoped at the very least the bst should be standard for both mca & uscg. also the pay would be much better than trying to get work on a local vessel around here.

Not sure what I should do for a year though…

Question answered, the year of what to do is up to you. Either follow through with the Mca license , or start from scratch. BST is a week, or less, so big deal that its not accepted.

Thanks.

That being said, where on the east coast would be the best place to begin the job search, for entry level positions?

Looks like solid advice. Would like to pose a question to those present here myself if I may;
I have been approved to upgrade from 100 Ton to take the Mate 1600 INL and need to take 4 modules;

054- Rules of the road
072X Navigation General
073 Chart Navigation
261 Deck General+ Deck Safety& Environmental Protection

I am currently atill on active duty (US Navy) retiring his year. Can you reccomend where I can get study materiels for these modules? Thanks in advance for any help offered.

R
Scott