beacon test for Level 1 course - how fast?

[ak_telemike]

Question for the more experienced avalanche instructors. I'm organizing an NSP Levl 1 course for the first time, and I want to have a requirement that students be able to locate a single beacon within a certain time period. What's a good time?

The Level 2 curriculum we are adapting for our course next year has a requirement that students be able to locate a single beacon in a an 60m field in under 2 minutes, and locate 2 beacons buried in close proximity in under 10 minutes.

I've been thinking we should set our minimum standard at somewhere between 3 and 5 minutes for a single beacon.

What do you folks think?

any opinions welcome - not just avy pros - it would be good to get feedback from students as well

[AltaPowderDaze]

mike, as you know i'm just a student myself but i think it is imporant to have a student come away feeling that they are deficient in recovery. i'd hate for a student to meet the 5 min mark and think, "wow, i passed with flying colors". for a level 1, a student should be able to locate a beacon in under 3 min on a simple 30m x 30m slope. i don't think they should fail if they don't make this requirement but it does help them reassess the importance of staying out of trouble in the first place.

edit: you should also relay the stress factor in real searches. you never can predict how you'll react to the real thing. just because you can find a beacon in 2min in practice doesn't mean you can do the same under stress.

[yesIsaidyes]

I just finished a level 1 course and I agree there shouldn't be a set time - it just makes it too easy to say you "passed". As a student, I think the best feeling you can have walking away is that you learned to use the beacon fast, you know how to work to get faster, and you definitely want to get faster, no matter how fast you actually are. But if you do have a requirement or even bench-mark, 3-5 seems more than reasonable, even for people using conventional beacons.