President Cropper of Cal Maritime has recently announced his retirement. Curious as to what thoughts the industry has about that. As well as the current state of Cal Maritime.
Is there a reason he retired or just normal retirement? Honestly I’ve never heard anything exceptionally great or exceptionally bad about Cal. I don’t rank it as one of the top schools, but I don’t think it’s bad either. Just nothing that interesting about Cal. Other then the old west coast stereo type that it’s CasualMaritime (compared to east coast schools).
My experience with Cal Maritime grads has been uniformly good. Perhaps their time in school was more “casual” than a few other schools but their education and ability was on par with any maritime grads I worked with. At least they don’t need to get over the regiment quasi military BS 
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I also had good experiences with Cal cadets in the last few years. Sharp people and no “regiment” nonsense. I don’t care what company you are in or that you enjoy yelling at someone because they’re younger than you, can you do your job on a ship? Or as a cadet on board, do you want to learn? Yes I accept the regiment model can benefit some people but it is not a prerequisite to being a good crewmember and qualified for the job.
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