The Bermuda Sloop Foundation is looking to the community to help pay off its $1.4 million debt.

The Foundation, which owns the Spirit of Bermuda, has taken 950 young Bermudians sailing since it started operating three years ago.

Yesterday, Malcolm Kirkland, executive director of the charity, said: "We are looking to pay off the mortgage by January 1.

"Ninety-four percent of our donations come from Bermudians. We have not relied on the exempt companies as much as others to raise funds. The Spirit is a community ship and relies on the community to help fund it.

"One of our aims is to take a diverse group out. This summer as the ship crossed the Atlantic Ocean we had five trainees from the Bermuda Regiment, four people from Marine and Ports, others were a part of the Mirrors programme and some who are attending Adult Education."

To date the charity has paid off $8.1 million of the cost of building the three masted 118 foot ship, which is based on a historical sketch of a Bermuda Sloop.

Through their school programme they have taken hundreds of middle school students around the Island and brought them to Nonsuch Island and snorkelling on reefs. The middle school programme focuses on teaching them about the Island's maritime history, natural beauty and conservation as well as teamwork.

This year the Spirit will be taking students from every public school as well as private schools and is so booked that they have had to hire relief staff to ensure their professional crew does not get burned out.

During the summer months the Foundation focuses on taking a diverse group of Bermudian teens to ports such as the Azores, Portugal, Canary Islands, Turks and Caicos, Maine, Virginia and Prince Edward Island.

It also participated in the Tall Ship Atlantic Challenge this summer which saw the Spirit cover more than 7,000 nautical miles.

While in the Azores students learnt about the connection between Bermuda and the Portuguese island. This was the second trip the ship has taken which had a large focus on Bermuda's history. Last year it went to Turks and Caicos on what Mr. Kirkland called a "voyage of rediscovery".

Bermudians were the first permanent settlers of the Caribbean archipelago and Bermuda sloops once regularly plied the seas between there and North America delivering lucrative cargoes of salt mined by Bermudian entrepreneurs and their slaves.

While there students raked salt, as some of their ancestors did 200 years ago, visited museums and listened to speeches on slavery and the Atlantic trade from top academics across North America and the Caribbean.

Mr. Kirkland said that as well as running successful middle school trips and overseas trips the Foundation is committed to educating Bermudians and encouraging them to obtain international qualifications in the maritime industry.

The Marine Occupations programme offers students aged 16 to 21, who have expressed an interest in a marine career path, specific courses overseas as well as practical sea experiences. The end goal is for them to attain one of three levels of maritime accreditation. Participation in this programme is supplemented by paid professional internships in the students' area of focus aboard Spirit of Bermuda or on other ships.

Already the Sloop has had several trainees attend maritime education programmes in Maine, three of whom have committed to furthering their education and have worked on the Sloop while they are home from their studies.