Member Shawn Deehan is coordinating Gun Rights Week coming up this week from February 11-14 (Wednesday through Saturday). Each night from Wednesday through Friday there will be speakers from 7 PM to 9 PM.
I will be speaking on the night of Thursday, February 12th.
Hundreds of students are expected to attend this event from around the state.
URGENT CALL FOR INSTRUCTORS
The event needs ten (10) NRA certified firearms instructors on Saturday, February 14th, from 10 AM to 3 PM top help teach around 100 new college students to shoot.
The shooting will be done at:
U.S. Training and Development Center Top Gun Shooting Range
4883 Early Road
Harrisonburg, VA 22801
540-434-8999
Also needed are nine 9MM pistols for the students to use while being taught to shoot.
If you can help, please let me know and I will forward to Shawn.
If there are any NRA certified instructors out there who can show up in Harrisonburg that Saturday, please contact Phillip VanCleave (philip@virginiasystems.com) and let him know ASAP.
I’m not NRA certified yet, (the cert classes seem to be hard to find) but I’ve offered to show up and help keep a safe range if they need a hand. I’ve also volunteered to provide several 9mm handguns for use in instructing the college kids who attend the range session. I would imagine spare eye and ear pro would also be welcome.
If any M4Carbiners plan to attend and help out, I’d be more than happy to buy you some lunch/dinner/whathaveyou. While Harrisonburg isn’t a gourmet mecca, they do have some nice restaurants in the area.
Originally posted by 30cal:
That’s funny, considering you have more training under your belt than most LEO’s do.
Yes…well…I wasn’t planning on bringing that up.
I’m on good terms with a few of the LEO’s in my area…but only two of them have any idea what sort of training I have. One happened to be at one of the BW carbine classes I attended. He’s now back home (he worked some BW contracts in the 'Stan) and back on the SWAT team.
I can certainly understand their desire to have certified NRA instructors, especially if they’re planning to run the class according to a boilerplate NRA syllabus for Basic Pistol.
There is also a significant difference between someone who has a lot of shooting training/experience and someone who has professional teaching training. Like most prerequisites, you’ll undoubtedly lose some good guys along with all the bad ones, but it’s a simple checkbox to use as a go/no-go rather than depending on a detailed individual assessment.
I could be wrong, but I don’t think it’s going to be an NRA class proper…more like a very brief introduction to firearms and some limited live fire with a heavy focus on safe handling and eliminating the stigma on guns.
I’m still awaiting details from the event coordinator, but my initial read is that the NRA instructors thing is aimed mainly at not having any idiots who do dumb things in a position to supervise rank noobs in the handling of firearms. As soon as I get the contact information for the coordinator I’ll try to find out how this shindig is supposed to run.
It is my understanding that a non NRA certified individual can facilitate and coach during an NRA sanctioned class as long as there is a Certified Instructor/Training Coordinator in charge.
I just received an e-mail from the event coordinator with some more information:
Please do come and bring your friend and the 9mm’s you mentioned.
We will begin to prepare students for the line at 9 am. 9 students will go to the line with 9 instructors and one Range Master. We will work in shifts to keep the lanes busy and get student shooters safely to and from the line. The more instructors, the more students we can give an opportunity to experience shooting for the first time.
We are looking for Glock 9mm’s primarily and any 9mm ammo that you can spare, to help us defray ammo costs. Not trying to use up your personal ammo, but, if you can spare just a little it would be a huge help.
We really need your connections and your presence.
It sounds like they are really scrambling for help putting this thing on, so at this point I think anyone who can contribute in any way will be put to work somehow.
If anyone has some spare 9mm ammo to contribute to the cause…
It sounds to me like they’ve really been struggling to put this thing together. Perhaps at future events they could get some sponsorships to help out with some of this stuff.
For those wondering about directions to the range, it’s thankfully very simple.
Harrisonburg has a Cracker Barrel that’s just off of Interstate 81:
121 Pleasant Valley Rd
Harrisonburg, VA 22801
(540) 574-3099
The exit from 81 takes you on to route 11. You’ll make a right on to Pleasant Valley road. There will be a beat up Ramada on the corner and past that there’s the Cracker Barrel. If you keep driving past the CB you’ll encounter a stop light on an overpass that goes over 81. If you take the right immediately after that light you’ll be on the road you need.
You’ll pass an auto auction and the HQ of Tactical & Survival Specialties (some of you in LE may have dealt with them) and a couple of warehouses. At the very end of the road on the left you’ll see the US Training and Development Center, which houses the indoor range we’ll be using.
I’ll have my cell with me and I’ll be more than willing to assist in getting folks to the range since I know the area fairly well. PM me if you intend to come and I’ll give you my cell number. If you can make it to the CB I can run up the road and lead you back to the range.
I’ll be there at 0900 sharp with 2 G17’s and a G19 plus some ammo. I guess I can bring a AA kit for the 17 also. Anybody in Richmond need or want to ride PM me before 11pm and we can work it out, I can take a couple easy.
