Looking for firearms instructor in PA/MD/WV

**Prophet** · May 21st, 2016, 07:34 PM

I'm near Chambersburg, PA and my girlfriend lives near Ranson, WV. I'm currently slated to leave for the Coast Guard in early September, and my girlfriend and I are getting married either directly before or following my completion of boot camp. I'm probably going to be assigned to a cutter for the first year or two which means she's going to be spending a lot of time at home, going back and forth to work and things by herself in an unfamiliar place. Fortunately she intends to get her concealed carry permit, and wants me to take her to the range more often than I'm able to take her. I've taught her a lot of the fundamentals of shooting and she's an incredibly receptive hands-on learner, and likes disassembling/reassembling/cleaning the handguns as much as she likes shooting them (we've been using an SR-22 but next time we go we're going to shoot some larger-caliber pistols too). I feel like she has even more potential than I'm capable of cultivating in her because even though I know how to shoot, I"m not highly experienced and am not an instructor, and I feel that her skill and confidence would benefit greatly from a defensive pistol course of sorts. Quite frankly mine would too. So I'm curious if anyone has any actual experience with good, no-nonsense, basic defensive pistol/concealed carry courses in this area that we could attend (most likely separately). Also curious as to whether anyone has any experience with female instructors as I feel that my girlfriend would probably be more comfortable in such a setting.

Thanks!

P.S. feel free to recommend yourself if you happen to be a qualified instructor in the area, but realize that I'm looking more for customer review-type recommendations so if you can provide that for yourself it would be a great help!

**Karys** · May 22nd, 2016, 04:03 PM

I would look around for a local NRA Personal Protection Inside the Home course on the NRA website. After that you can move on to Personal Protection Outside the Home.

They're both good intro defensive courses and they should be more affordable than other more professional training.

**TheTailhound** · May 23rd, 2016, 02:40 PM

Have you taken into consideration where you are going to live in the future? Please correct me if i am wrong but concealed carry permits vary from state to state. To make matters worse, i think MD still has that pesky "need a very good excuse to carry" clause that they often use to deny permits.

As far as classes are concerned, look up www.eventbrite.com and use search terms like Basic Handgun or Defensive Handgun and then start sorting through the various courses/events. Who knows, you might see something you like. I can tell you from personal experience that i have been shooting for the past 30 years and i took my first "class" only a couple of weeks back. It was a lot of fun and i learned something new. In the past, i have had the chance to shoot with a few of my friends who were/some still are in the military and their approach to shooting was a lot different.

If she has her fundamentals down pat, she could go to different courses, take it for their course value and then come up with her own method of shooting, reloading and other aspects of firearm proficiency. There is no one single method that is good in a gunfight, there are several. Learn and learn some more but do not get stagnant. Shooting with my friends taught me that. EVERY SINGLE ONE of them had different ways of doing things like reloading, shooting while moving, kneeling, crouching, shooting from cover, etc.

Sorry if i don't have any concrete "Go here and train" advice for you.

**MT1** · May 23rd, 2016, 03:16 PM

Just about any local gun club that hosts NRA classes would be a very good start. NRA classes are among the least expensive option, they cover the basics and advanced classes, and the instructors are trained to a well established standard.

Check out the NRA instructor home page. Select "Find a Course" and scroll to the bottom to search by zip code.