Ambassador Sidney Collie is pictured with Lieutenant Ruperthera Symonette of the Royal Bahamas Defense Force at the graduation dinner held at the United States Coast Guard Training Center in Yorktown, Virginia, November 28.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — His Excellency Sidney Collie, Bahamas Ambassador to the United States and Permanent Representative to the Organization of American States (OAS), on Wednesday, November 28, 2018, attended a graduation dinner at the United States Coast Guard Training Center in Yorktown, Virginia, for students from 22 countries who successfully completed a 16-week training program, including Lieutenant Ruperthera Symonette of The Royal Bahamas Defense Force.
According to the United States Coast Guard website, the course “is the centerpiece of Coast Guard international resident training” and “is designed for mid-grade officers and civilians who have been specially selected because of their potential future roles as leaders.”
Since the 1960s, the Training Center Yorktown “has been home-away-from-home to thousands of international students from more than 100 naval and coast guard services while continuing its long-standing tradition of providing training in a variety of technical and professional courses,” the website noted.
“In 1998 the International Resident Training Branch was established to manage the ever-expanding international program, which currently involves 250 international students from upwards of 60 countries annually,” the website said.
The website added that under the sponsorship of the State Department Security Assistance Program (SATP), this “people-to-people” program “enables civilian and military personnel from many nations to participate in Coast Guard training programs in order to acquire new skills or to advance technical and professional capabilities.”
“Approximately 250 international students — officer, enlisted and civilian — annually attend the full spectrum of Training Center Yorktown schools and courses: Search and Rescue (SAR), Maritime Safety, Aids to Navigation, Engineering and Weapons, Maritime Law Enforcement, and Small Boat Operations,” the website states. “In addition, there are courses designed especially for international students, the International Crisis Command and Control (ICCC), International Leadership and Management Seminar (ILAMS), and the International Maritime Officers Course (IMOC).”
