Making a Ski or Snowboard Instructor Course Part of Your Gap Year

What are the benefits of taking a gap year?

There are a great many reasons as to why a gap year can benefit an individual. Coming out of school, while you may not necessarily think it (!) you are still very dependant on the safe and comforting environment of school and family life. Therefore heading straight to university or into the work place can be a very daunting experience. When used properly, a gap year can be an individual’s personal challenge, illustrating that you can take a risk by doing something of your own accord. Succeeding in your personal challenge is a huge confidence boost, helping you to become a mature individual as you discover things about yourself which you did not necessarily know from before.

From a university’s perspective, a candidate who has taken a year out or a gap year from education and then chosen to return to it, shows that they are truly dedicated to furthering their education through a degree, and therefore presents the individual as a candidate who is far less likely to drop out of university at a later date, something which all universities or academic institutions are constantly trying to avoid. Similarly, from an employer’s perspective, people that have been on a gap year are likely to have a level of maturity, because, as cliché as it sounds, they have gained life experience which those coming straight from school will not have.

Doing something constructive in your gap year, such as a ski instructor training course, furthers these benefits to an even greater extent…

Why should I do a ski or snowboard instructor course in my gap year?

Over the past few years, ski and snowboard instructor training and courses have become increasingly popular for people embarking on their gap year. Why is this? In our opinion, it is because people are realising the importance of doing something constructive in their gap years, such as a gap year ski or snowboard course. Rather than just going off and doing a ski season working in a bar and skiing in your spare time, which would give someone some sort of life experience as mentioned above, a ski or snowboard training course is a considerably more constructive way of spending your time on the slopes. As well as giving you the potential of gaining a qualification to add to your CV, undergoing ski or snowboard training and improving at something contributes hugely to an individual’s personal development.

Skills such as being able to work as a team and the ability to cope whilst working in unfamiliar and difficult situations come naturally during the course of a ski or snowboard training program due to the very nature of being away from home and doing something perhaps slightly out of your comfort zone. In addition to this, completing a ski instructor training course over the period of a few months in your gap year illustrates the ability to commit to something and to finish it.

As well as all of these fantastic benefits, being away from home in a strange environment is a great way to meet some amazing people who are all in exactly the same situation as you with at least one thing in common…snow, snow and a bit more snow! As we see every year and as our seasonaires have said, those that have been on our ski and snowboard instructor courses have made friends for life, as everyone who embarks on a ski or snowboard gap year course is embarking on their own personal challenges together.