What do you look for in training?

[Sal Picante]

I looked on the forum, and, of course, there are a myriad of AAR's/Annoucements, but this is more "meta-topical".
I'm curious what people are looking for when evaluating instructors & classes.
Wondering if anyone is willing to share?

I sorta came up with the following questions, which are meant to be a bit open ended/reflective:

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

[Sal Picante]

I'll take my own medicine:

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

Pistol shooting-wise, I'm pretty well into mastery and unconscious competence.
Rifle-wise, I'm slightly above average. Consciously competent, perhaps.

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

Depends on the subject, of course; I'm more and more interested in shooting rifles (ARs) and would like to learn more about being able to shoot well to 300 yards with irons and optics at the capability of the rifle (e.g. if it is a ~1 moa gun, do that...).
I do understand hold-over inside of say 15 yards pretty well, but it isn't 100% subconscious yet. There are serious gaps that I need to identify in rifle-craft.

Pistol-wise, I tend to enjoy taking classes on the basics, just to see how other people are describing it (honestly, I get to audit classes from time to time) - discussing the basics never wears me out. If I'm paying my $$, then it is all about application:
Applying BJJ to guns/guns to BJJ or competition movement or "weaponized geometry" and the application of tactics to the craft of pistol shooting. I usually seek out private courses on topics that I'm very familiar with, competition-focus, whereas I enjoy taking an open-enrollment course for other focus areas.

I'm really trying to map out and bridge the gap between mastery of the fundamentals and application.

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

Course is safe within reason; e.g. if you're taking ECQC and you get mildly injured that's ok. Shooting at the target while the camera man is next to it? No thank you!
Course is well described with pre-defined learning criteria/takeaways.
Course describes a path (not the only path) towards attaining skill with the takeaways and describes a practice regimen/routine.
Course provides written material or provides readily available references or the opportunity to take notes and ask questions on topics.

I'm extremely externally unmotivated: I don't much care about awards, certificates, coins, pins, hats/swag, etc... I'm racing myself.

Courses that I've considered great successes: ECQC. Cecil's Pugilism/grappling/guns class. Redbeard Combatives guns/grappling class.
John Dufresene's Weaponized Geometry class (most excellent).
Paul Sharps REV Pistol is still one of my favorite fundamental's classes - the see one, do one, teach one method really shines.
John Krupa/Team Spartan (Illinois) Classes. John has a great lecture/great written material and is extremely competent running the line.

[JRB]

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

1 being a gun-idiot and 10 being a GM or FAST coin high-speed, I'm probably a 4 with pistols and a 6-7 with rifles.

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

I prefer technical focus as a beginner/intermediate. Once those fundamentals of technical skill are established, say around skill level 6/10, I prefer instruction tailored for my particular applications of that skill.

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

Before the class:
-Clear learning goals/objectives on what I'm learning or improving throughout the class. This should be very clear and specific in the course description. (to the point you already made)
-A clear and reasonably accurate checklist of prerequisites both in equipment, ammo/support gear, and existing skillset.
-A clear rubric of what's being covered in the class each morning/afternoon/evening of the class.

At the class:
-Establish bona-fides in a 30min-45min intro at the beginning of the course, and then firmly move all the roll call & war stories to downtime. Exceptions being something where there's a specific context or real-life lesson learned that's significant to a specific training evolution or stage, and stuff like that of course.
-Class structure that is sequential/progressive; instructors that thoughtfully and individually establish a 'baseline' on each student's skill, and build upward from there toward a uniform-ish outcome/end-state. Fix the 'easy stuff' with a student early on in the class so they get that much more out of the class.

After the class:
-Instructors provide meaningful constructive feedback on specific things each student did well & what to keep improving. I know that can be difficult with timing and student:instructor ratios at times, but a gathering where they pass out some hats and say 'errrbody dun gud!' doesn't help guide me to continued improvement.

Otherwise, @Les Pepperoni, you've really nailed everything else.

[Sal Picante]

1 being a gun-idiot and 10 being a GM or FAST coin high-speed, I'm probably a 4 with pistols and a 6-7 with rifles...

Thanks for responding...

[Moylan]

This has changed for me in the 4 years or so that I've been trying to be serious about pistol shooting. After laying down a baseline of a pretty wide variety of basic defensive pistol stuff, I have become very narrowly focused for the last year and change on very specific training goals. My main use of time and money is on match shooting at this point, to continue working on my skills. But for training, I have a list of classes on my to-do list that are all meant to address things I've not yet encountered.

My list includes (A) Strategos 2 day church security planning, (2) Citizens Defense Research The Armed Parent/Guardian, (3) FASTER Level 2 (active shooter response class for teachers and school administrators held at TDI Ohio), (4) a good vehicle class. Was hoping to get to a vehicle class taught by VIGR this December, but at present it doesn't look like that will work out.

What I expect is that once I get to most or all of these classes, I will take a turn back to performance and seek out training with someone like Tim Herron or Ben Stoeger or whatever: a class to help me with the gaming side of things. But that is likely another 2 years or more down the road.

To answer the specific questions:

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

USPSA says my skill at present is 58.8835. I've done a fair bit of open enrollment training, including with Craig Douglas, Ernest Langdon, Tatiana Whitlock, Claude Werner, John Murphy and others.

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

As described above.

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

Fills a niche I need filled, taught by people with what my research suggests is well-deserved national reputations.

[LittleLebowski]

I looked on the forum, and, of course, there are a myriad of AAR's/Annoucements, but this is more "meta-topical".
I'm curious what people are looking for when evaluating instructors & classes.
Wondering if anyone is willing to share?

I sorta came up with the following questions, which are meant to be a bit open ended/reflective:

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

1.) About a 7 across the board with pistols, long guns, and carbines.

2.) I’ve no idea what this means.

3.) Learning/becoming better, professionalism, and having fun.

[0ddl0t]

I haven't taken a class since covid, but I'm starting to look around again.

1.) What would you say your skill level is?

Compared to people who own guns? top 5%
Compared to people who regularly shoot? top 25%
Compared to people who regularly compete? Bottom 50%

2.) Are you seeking instruction that is meant to be technically focused or application focused?

75% technical / 25% application. Generally I prefer learning widely transferable shooting skills, but sometimes I enjoy a class geared toward 1 unique application.

3.) What constitutes a good class for you?

One that helps me learn on my own between classes. One that quickly identifies what I don't know so I can investigate/pursue on my own. I see classes as a check-up between training to ensure I'm on the right track.

Ideally I get feedback immediately after shooting and can hear feedback given to other shooters to hopefully learn from their mistakes.

Bad classes waste time between shooting, needlessly delve into divisive politics/topics, and/or are nothing more than a schedule of drills with no feedback.

[Sal Picante]

2.) I’ve no idea what this means.

That's good feedback; Lemme attempt to clarify:

Taking pistolcraft as an example, I'd argue that shooting skills, e.g. tasks like triggering, aiming, sight usage, fall under this technical focus . Training/education at this level answers a question such as "Can you show me how to shoot a handgun?"

Again, using pistolcraft, I'd argue that an application focused classes use the skill as a fundamental block, but aren't necessarily about that particular skill.
Take something like structure clearing. It is a crash course in navigating angles, figuring out how to get setup to take the shot/etc and not so much about the fundamental skills of pistolcraft. Training/education at this level answers the question "How do handgun skills apply to room clearing?"

[Sal Picante]

75% technical / 25% application. Generally I prefer learning widely transferable shooting skills, but sometimes I enjoy a class geared toward 1 unique application.

Can you give an example of a class that is geared toward 1 unique application?

Bad classes waste time between shooting, needlessly delve into divisive politics/topics, and/or are nothing more than a schedule of drills with no feedback.

I hear you on that... I hate downtime.

I'm the dude that keeps shooting during lunch... (That's Mike Pannone's hands on the CZ behind me.)

http://instagram.com/p/BRzRhAJg-li/

[Sal Picante]

Citizens Defense Research The Armed Parent/Guardian

That's a great class. I really enjoyed it. Some of the lessons, I think about daily since I've got a 7yo kiddo...