West Virginia Wildlife from Eyewitness News

Hunter's Education On-Line

Hunter's education just got a lot easier.

August 22, 2007
Reporter: Patrick McMurtry
Videographer: Brad Rice

EYEWITNESS ONLINE WEBCAST VIDEO
C L I C K T O P L A Y

It's almost time to head into the woods and do a little hunting, but before you go, you have to make sure you meet all the legal requirements. For if you're born after 1974, that means you have to have completed the hunters education class. Here's the good news, now it's a lot easier to take that class.

Lt. Tim Coleman/DNR says:
'We're going to offer the hunter's education class online. This basically gives people more opportunity to atend the class. These are a lot of school activities in the fall and people that want to hunt may not be able to get into a class. People tend to wait until the last minute. This way they have another alternative, they can get out and get the course and get out there and hunt."

Everyone agrees that the hunters education classes makes for a much safer environment for everyone taking a gun into the woods. But lt. Coleman says getting into a class was such a hassle that a lot of people just decided not to even go hunting.

Lt. Tim Coleman/DNR says:
"There was a study done a few years ago that said hunter's education might actually be a deterrent to hunting because it's so hard to get into a class and people, at least in this state and I'm sure across the country, always wait until the last minute, these classes are full, they can't get into the class, they get frustrated and can't go hunting."

So the challenge was finding a way to make it easier on folks to take the class, while making sure they learned the life-saving information found in the hunter's educacation classes.

Lt. Tim Coleman/DNR says:
"This is the alternative, they can take the course at their own pace, they do have to come to us and do a practical test, a hands on exam and a written test. Basically the standard course is about 3 days long, they take the web course and eliminate 2 of the 3 days."

You will have to pre-register, be able to print out some of the pages from the online class and be able to make it to a pre-arrainged dnr site to take your final test. After that, good luck.