I don't know any successful guides that went to guide school. I look at those schools as a great way for some outfitters to make some shoulder season cash. I will teach you how to be a guide, or at least as much as I can in a week for $1000. How about a week when I'm not booked like mid march. You can row me around for a week while I fish and I will give you helpful pointers.

I agree with Ron that there are too many guides competing for a shrinking number of trips. To become a guide here I rowed a lot, bought a boat and owned and used it for a solid year and then I became a guide. It's been 4 years and it's still not that easy to make money at it, but it does get a little better every year. You have to deal with jackass outfitters that don't pay you, pshycopathic outfitters that pull guns on clients (this is a different story in itself) and all kinds of other bs. Then at the end of the year when you're pretty much broke again you have to get all your licensing and stuff for the next year and pay social security too.

Sometimes it is rewarding and you click with people and you have a great time. Sometimes you have some guy that says "ok" or "I know" everytime you tell him that he's doing the same thing wrong that you've been telling him to fix all day long. People go on vacation, brain go on vacation, and you have to deal with that. I like guiding but it takes the patience of a saint sometimes and the ability to extract hooks from your body while saying things like "oh, it happens all the time, don't worry about it".

Good luck.