Accurate Edge, LLC is a Florida company. We offer NRA courses and Florida Concealed Firearm License (FL does not issue Permits) training.
The following NRA courses are offered at both the Basic level and the Instructor level:
Pistol, Rifle, Shotgun
Personal Protection In the Home
Personal Protection Outside the Home
Home Firearm Safety
We also offer the NRA Refuse To Be A Victim personal protection course, as well as Range Safety Officer and Chief Range Safety Officer courses.
Training Counselor Workshops are also available
See our Training Schedule page for information on currently scheduled courses or contact us if you have a need for a course that is not yet on our schedule.
Before you take any course, one of ours or someone elses, if your only goal is to get a Florida Concealed Weapons or Firearm License, know that you may not need any more training at all. According to FL Statute 790.06 (2) (h), if you have any of the following you can apply for a license without taking a class (no one else in Florida will tell you this, they just want your money, we want you to be informed):
1. Military DD 214
2. Florida Hunter Safety Course Completion Certificate
3. Documentation of attending any (any!) firearm training available to the general public
4. Documentation of completing any NRA course anywhere in the country
5. Documentation of competition participation, whether it's NRA or IDPA or IPSC or other
6. If you held a FCWL (CWP) in Florida before and it expired or was otherwise rescinded as long as it was not for cause
So, if you meet any of the above then you do NOT need to spend the money for another course. But if you want to further your education in firearms training and self defense, then contact us and register for one of our classes. That's what we're here for.
Links
Be sure to visit these other sites often. They're great resources for additional educational information.
Lethal Force Institute
If you carry a concealed firearm, then LFI-1 is a must-attend course.
First Coast International Defensive Pistol Assn.
Come join us on the first Saturday of each month to practice street-style
self-defense scenarios.
Armed Citizens Legal Defense Network, LLC
A terrific resource for legal defense support before, during, and after a self-defense encounter.
JB Training LLC
Airsoft training, including force-on-force scenarios.
GPI Gunsmithing, Refinishing, Laser Engraving
Specialty Gun Sales & Manufacturing
It’s NOT a Weapon
(or, at least it’s not the only one)
by Tom Eichling
Okay, so what is that ‘thing’ you have at home, carry in your car, or have in a holster on your belt?Is it a weapon or a tool?What is a weapon?
A weapon is merely a tool that becomes useful for offense or defense, depending on the situation.Hopefully, no one here will ever use one for offense except in the line of police or military duty.Thus, for the average civilian, guns are self defense tools and we should think of them in that way.Firearms are also the tools and equipment used for marksmanship training and competition.
Firearms can be weapons, yes.So can car keys, automobiles, fire extinguishers, baseball bats, toothpicks, and screwdrivers.Yet, you don’t tell your spouse that ‘you are going to the garage to get your weapon so you can tighten the screws on the front door hinge’.Or, do you?Somehow I doubt it.So, if you don’t call your screwdriver a weapon on a daily basis then why call your firearm a weapon on a daily basis?Sure, you could use your screwdriver as a weapon.But it’s not commonly used or referred to in that way.It’s a tool.
Go into a hardware store and ask the employees where their weapons are located and you’ll probably get some strange looks, to say the least.There are all kinds of weapons in the store, such as screwdrivers, nail guns (yep, guns), saws, drills, and more. Some of these same types of things are even used in (orthopedic) surgery, but they’re called surgical tools (yep, tools).
The term weapon is regularly used by some politicians and the media to define guns as bad things.As shooters, hunters, NRA members, instructors, and Second Amendment backers, we should be trying to turn that around.
The State of
Florida has already helped to get this started, but many haven’t noticed.Part of that is the fault of the curriculum of some of the short two hour concealed carry classes held throughout the state since those instructors haven’t noticed or don’t care.Chapter 790 of the
Florida statutes is entitled Weapons or Firearms.The state separates firearms from other weapons.If you read your carry license, it’s entitled a Concealed Weapon or Firearm License (CWFL).So, it’s not a Concealed Weapons Permit (CWP) as so many insist on calling it.
FS 790.06 (2) (h) (7) provides details on what the Florida legislature wants license applicants to learn as well as the instructor’s duties and record keeping requirements.
Florida does not require any training in
Florida law or statute in order to apply for a carry license.The only thing they require is training in firearm safety and marksmanship.Yet, much of what is taught in short courses is about the
Florida statutes, while the safety and marksmanship issues are glossed over.In some courses, the instructor even loads and unloads the pistol for the student!The rest of the class covers law and statute rather than more extensive firearm training.This can be risky.I’ve heard of at least one class being shut down for this.
The National Rifle Association requires that an attorney or other person qualified by the State of
Florida to teach law and statute conduct lesson III in each of the personal protection courses.Most NRA instructors and many K license instructors do not meet the requirement to teach it.The topic varies slightly between the two courses but it is about the legal aspects of using deadly force, self defense, and carrying concealed firearms.Perhaps
Florida should adopt the NRA standard regarding teaching this topic in the short courses.Unqualified instructors who teach this topic might be exposing themselves to some liability issues.NRA’s requirement helps to shield NRA and the instructors from most, and perhaps all, of these liability issues.
NRA instructors and lesson III guest speakers are precluded from using the term ‘weapon’ in NRA approved courses.Yet, in all of the short courses that I’ve seen that are NOT NRA approved courses, the term is used in almost every other sentence.Thus, the term becomes ingrained in the mind of the student who then goes out and uses it all day in public venues.The sad thing is that many NRA instructors, who should know better, are the ones who are consistently doing this in their courses because they are conducting courses that are NOT NRA approved so they don’t necessarily have to follow NRA policy.
When applying for a course called a CWP course, ask the staff if they are going to teach you about edged weapons, or numchuks, or throwing stars, or ballistic knives, or stun guns, or pepper spray, etc.They’ll tell you no.They are going to teach you about firearms.Yet they call it, incorrectly, a CWP class or a concealed weapons class.This is also part of the terminology issue since each of these items could also be theoretically used as a tool (numchuks as a pry bar, throwing stars as fancy letter openers for instance).
FS 790.001 (13) defines weapons (note the firearm exemption):"Weapon" means any dirk, knife, metallic knuckles, slungshot, billie, tear gas gun, chemical weapon or device, or other deadly weapon except a firearm or a common pocketknife, plastic knife, or blunt-bladed table knife.
So, are firearms ‘weapons’ when used for conventional pistol or rifle marksmanship competition?Certainly not.They are tools.Equipment.For defense purposes, they are tools to help prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to you or another person.Unfortunately, those few civilians who use firearms as offensive weapons to disrupt public safety are what the media and some politicians focus on and are what gives them reason to brand firearms as weapons rather than tools.I grant you that sporting equipment such as firearms and baseball bats, or tools like firearms and screwdrivers, can become weapons but only after they’re used in that way, not before.
It’s this terminology issue that needs to be addressed.CWFL holders and law-abiding gun owners use firearms as tools.But, since the media and many politicians try to paint our tools and equipment in the blackest way possible (as weapons that are bad for public safety), we need to counter them in our own way to help protect our Second Amendment rights and our freedom to compete and to defend ourselves.So, call your gun a gun, firearm, rifle, pistol, shotgun, air gun, black powder rifle, wheel gun, or even a bullet launcher... but not a weapon.
It’s your choice, your decision whether this is an important issue.NRA seems to think so.The
Florida legislature seems to think so.Maybe we should, too.We need to use proper terminology and properly educate the public, because the media and the anti-gun politicians certainly won’t do it for us.We need to stop promoting their agenda for them.