Serious question about PADI

[paolov]

as far as DIR.

DIR is learning from mistakes of others. implying that you have advanced experience in the sport. at tiems i lessens task loading at times the preparation itself is task loading. I adopt DIR when it applies.

 

[miketsp]

The one thing I really don't like about the US based agencies is the taboo on deco diving - so they don't teach it properly even though they recognise that many people do it.
When I did my basic CMAS 1 star course (=OW) the instructor told us clearly what we were being qualified to do ie no deco dives, but then spent a long time making sure that if we had to, we knew how to plan & execute deco dives safely.

 

[garyfotodiver]

At least as I understand it, the US agencies teach at the beginning level recreational diving. It is interpreted as no decompression diving. The PADI OW course I observed last year did teach what to do if a diver exceeded the NDL during a dive. The instructor also went over what to do if the NDL was approached.

There is no reason to plan and execute a decompression dive at this level of education and experience. If one wants to do long, deep, or mixed gas diving, there are courses to take.

 

[Don Burke]

After reading about a page and 1/2 of the previous PADI AND THE FUTURE thread, I did have a very serious question:

I am new to diving and this board: I detect a dislike of PADI among the posters? Why is that?

PADI is big and easy to pick on. They also seem to come up with a special certification for every single thing a diver wants to do.

When I was looking into diving I was only familiar with PADI. However the time I needed to get certified within before a trip forced me to use a SSI shop about an hour away in another town. (The local PADI shop's course ran through the departure date of my trip.) At the time, I was uncertian about using SSI which I had never heard of.

My open water cert is SSI. My AOW and nitrox are PADI. I've found that the instructor makes more of a difference than the agency

I seem to get a feel from this board that this may have been a good thing?????? Do you folks think SSI is better than PADI?

They seem to be pretty close. From the divers I have been in the water with, YMCA and NAUI seem to be abit better than the rest. That is just from my limited perspective.

I however felt my SSI class was a bit rushed, and my instructor left us with the instructions to treat our certification like a "learners permit."

They are usually a bit rushed if you are in a class. Private lessons are really the only way around that.

Are you down on PADI becuse they are the "fast food" of diving or what?

That combined with them being so big and the large number of specialty courses they offer

What is
DIR?

Years ago, George Irvine III wrote an article titled "Do it right or don't do it at all." It was basically a response to technical/cave diving accidents, many fatal, and how diving could be made safer. The name evolved to "Doing It Right" or "DIR". It is a refinement of "Hogarthian" diving and has produced an agency, Global Underwater Explorers.

It has also produced "diving evangalists" who will annoy the heck out of you if you let them and "anti-DIR fanatics" who seem to have nothing better to do than imagine problems with DIR.

 

[DandyDon]

I am new to diving and this board: I detect a dislike of PADI among the posters? Why is that?

Many of us like Padi as much as any. The problem is the money motivation. If Scuba was taught well by all, it'd cost much more than take much longer to get certified, and there's be a lot less divers - overall, a much smaller sport, more expensive to all.

Looking back, I wish I'd spent the money for private DM buddies on the first 20 dives, but like most of us - I survived.

 

[ninjamuzo]

I am a PADI instructor, was an IANTD instructor and have certifications from TDI, CDAA,SSI and others.

First of all what the others have written about instructors is correct I have see good ones and bad ones regardless of the agency.

There is always an issue of certifying agency pride especially with the smaller more technical agencies. CDAA divers for example consider their teaching standards to be higher than others. BSAC graduates are similar

As a past teaching professionsl I rate PADI's instructional materials typically superior to the others in terms of presentation, structure, neatness etc.

Some of the course materials I have had were very basic and in some cases quite poor in terms of presentation and the coverage of the material. If you are learning from a non-PADI institution you often have to rely on the knowledge of the Instructor to get all of the theory out. With the PADI materials it is all there.

The PADI teaching methodology is exactly that a methodology and it is designed that way to keep some consistancy between instructors all over the world. It is also designed to protect their instructors in case of a problem, i.e. if you follow all the steps and cover all the requirements then it is usually the methodology that goes on trial not the instructor.

Bottom line however is your instructor if they know what they are doing, want to teach you and cover the required skill then it doesn't matter what agency (I mean the major ones here) you use.

 

[alemaozinho]

The quality of the instruction (course )is the only thing you should be your concern,the Instructor will be the point of you having a pleasant or unpleasant experience,not the certifying agency.

 

[Walter]

Interesting that a bunch of folks who like PADI feel qualified to answer a question about why people don;t like PADI. You're wrong. I don't care how big or little PADI is. I don't care if they are for profit or non profit. I don't care if they have a zillion specialties or none. All agencies, PADI included, have good and bad instructors - what has this to do with someone's like or dislike of PADI?

I, personally dislike PADI because they have some of the lowest standards in the industry and mislead people by saying they have the highest standards in the industry. They mislead people by having "5 star" facilities when the 5 stars is not a rating, but they let you assume it is.

Some will tell you (as Otter did earlier in this thread) that all agencies meet RSTC minimum standards and therefore all agencies have basically the same standards. That's like a school board requiring math. One school teaches addition and subtraction while another teaches algebra and some yahoo telling you math is math. Some agencies exceed those minimums, others don't. There's a big difference in standards from one agency to another.

I agree with Don, while there are exceptions, YMCA and NAUI trained divers tend to be more skilled.

 

[s7595]

dougk
I am under a year cert with just 30dives and counting ,padi trained . here is my 2cents . get with a good buddy ,what is a good buddy ?.when you turn your head to see were he is ,he is rite there. get into the habit of checking your guages every 1-3 mins , end a dive with 1000psi and do your saftey stop. why do I say this simple you have a learners permit so do not push limits .just dive I love it so much

 

[MikeFerrara]

The reason so many notice that whether or not you get a good class is dependant on the instructor is because the agency minimums and day to day practices do little to insure that the class will be good.

"They all meet the RSTC minimums"...Big deal! Look who wrote them.