Close to 30 students from around Fiji are attending a ten day boot camp at the Fiji Maritime Academy Suva Campus.

FMA Chief Executive Officer Mahesa Abeynayake said the boot camp focuses on creating a bond be­tween students and their lecturers

“The idea of the boot camp is to start off their curriculum with them bonding in the academy; we started this programme with the Fiji Navy two years ago and this year we have moved it to the acad­emy,” Mr Abeynayake said.

“The main idea behind this camp is to provide our freshmen the basic training, they get up in the morning, they do their stuff, ar­range their beds and they parade, do physical exercise and also go on tours to different places in which they are likely to be employed in,” he said.

He said there were other pro­grammes planned over the ten days which also include tours.

“The students and lecturers will visit Fiji Ports, Slipway, Goundar Shipping and we have evening ses­sions and nigh sessions as well.

“We hope that it will be a great time to bond with their various lec­turers .

“There are 30 in this batch, and there are two different pro­grammes, one is nautical science and the other is engineering.”

Mr Abeynayake also mentioned that this year the FMA recorded the highest number of female ca­dets compared to previous years.

“This year we have enrolled a to­tal of nine girls for our freshman courses and this is the highest number of girls we have enrolled so far.

“We have always had three to five enrolling with us each year but this year the number has increased and we are grateful for the response from young women in our society.

“We need students to understand the marine environment; we need them to research the career paths available in the maritime sector and prepare themselves well before coming in to study.”