What is a training record book (TRB) for a cadet?

A training record book, or TRB, is the structured logbook a cadet completes during sea phases, recording every required training task as it is performed and having each one signed off by a qualified officer. It exists because a certificate of competency certifies practical ability, not just examination passes and sea days, and the TRB is the auditable evidence that the cadet has actually steered, plotted, sounded tanks, stripped pumps, kept watches and carried out the full syllabus of shipboard work under supervision.

The book is organised as a programme mapped to the STCW competences for the certificate being sought. Deck books cover navigation, watchkeeping, cargo work, ship handling, maintenance and safety; engine books cover operating and maintaining the machinery, electrical systems and engine room watchkeeping. The sign-off chain gives it weight: the task is witnessed and signed by the responsible officer, the designated shipboard training officer reviews progress, the master reviews and endorses the book, typically monthly, and the company and college training staff check it between voyages. When the cadet applies for the first certificate, the administration and the oral examiner scrutinise the completed book, and examiners routinely ask questions arising directly from tasks the candidate claims to have done.

Treat the book with the discipline it deserves, because it is the document most often mishandled: - Write it up weekly at least; reconstructing months of tasks from memory at the end of a contract produces thin, obvious padding. - Get signatures before the signing officer leaves the ship; chasing a former shipmate across the world for a missing signature delays certification. - Never fabricate an entry; examiners probe, and a candidate caught claiming unperformed tasks puts the certificate itself at risk. - Photograph or copy completed pages regularly, and carry the book in hand luggage, never in the hold, because a lost TRB can mean repeating training.

Used properly, the TRB is more than bureaucracy. It is the cadet's curriculum, ensuring the voyage is spent learning the required range of work rather than only the jobs the ship happens to need done, and it gives the cadet standing to ask officers for training opportunities, since both parties can see what remains outstanding. A well-kept, credible book smooths the path to the oral examination; a ragged one invites the hardest questions, so it repays steady attention from the first day aboard.