The Impact of Maritime Instructors' Experience on Trainee Seafarers' Competence: A Study on Hard and Soft Skills

This paper will investigate how the professional experience, technical competence, soft skills, and teaching practices of the maritime instructors can lead to competence and satisfaction of the maritime trainees. Quantitative, descriptive-analytical paradigm was chosen, and 302 students and trainees of Maritime Education and Training (MET) institutions were surveyed by means of a structured questionnaire comprising twenty-five items. The instrument included five key dimensions that were: hard skills, soft skills and teaching skills, field and sea-going experience, AI and technology in teaching and simulators and practical training. The statistical analysis of the data employed descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings reveal that the general degree of satisfaction of the trainees with the standard of teaching and training is mediocre. The technical competence of instructors and their experience at sea was generally seen as positive, especially with respect to relating theory and shipboard practice. Nevertheless, the areas of student engagement, interactive pedagogy, and technological and simulators used in pedagogical aspects turned out to need enhancement. The correlation analysis showed that there was a statistically significant positive correlation between hard skills and the use of AI and technology in the teaching process, and the rest of the relationships among the dimensions of the study were weak and insignificant, which can also be explained by the multidimensional aspect of the instructional quality in maritime education. The paper comes to the conclusion that an efficient maritime education cannot be based only on technical skills and professional experience. Rather, it involves a combined elaboration of technical, pedagogical, interpersonal, and technological skills of instructors. The results have practical implications for school curriculum development, training programs and quality assurance policies in Maritime Education and Training institutions.