Fancy a life taking people rock climbing? The Mountaineering Instructor Award may be the qualification for you.

Who’s it for?
People looking to teach, coach or guide multi-pitch climbing and general mountaineering, in summer conditions, throughout the UK and Ireland. This includes all mountain and sea cliff venues.

What’s it all about?
The award covers quite a range of topics including teaching multi-pitch climbing and mountaineering, looking after people on steep ground, improvised multi-pitch rescue techniques, navigation and a thorough understanding of access and environmental issues.

How does it work?
Pass your Mountain Leader Award, get personal multi-pitch climbing experience and experience leading groups in the mountains, register for the award, do a training course, consolidate your learning, go for assessment, continue developing as a Mountaineering Instructor Award holder. Once you have undertaken your training course you can join the Association of Mountaineering Instructors, one of the associations that will assist you both as a trainee and a qualified award holder.

The process from registration to completion will greatly depend on the time available for consolidation but it is generally recommended that you leave at least a year between training and assessment, but not more than 2-3 years.

Where can I use it?
The award is fundamentally designed for use within the mountainous and coastal climbing areas of the United Kingdom and Ireland. People have used the qualification as a measure of competence in many different areas worldwide, but the scheme is not specifically designed for this purpose.

Why do it?
Because you love climbing and want to operate at a higher level within mountain education. For some, it’s seen an opportunity to deliver other Mountain Training awards such as the Mountain Leader Award or Single Pitch Award.

This article is part of a series of articles celebrating Mountain Training’s 50th anniversary year in 2014

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