Should an instructor or agency be able to decertify divers?

[diverdown247]

There is enough flexibility in most certifying agency standards for the instructor to make judgement calls. He/She could easily require that further pool/ow sessions are needed to evaluate or develop a particular student's OW skills. Ultimately, it is up to the instructor to make the judgement on signing off for certifications.

There is enough power in the certifying agency to remove dive leadership. There are specific insurance and record keeping requirements to cover the instructor. Unfortunately, if a student was excellent during a class, but became neglectful of self/skills/others then for a period of time the related instructor could be looked at through a specific time frame. Trust me, this issue can and will come up for some instructors who fail to make that safe judgement call.

After all, it does say in the waivers that purchasing or taking a particular course does not guarantee certification.

 

[Skeeter1097]

A diver can pass the skills test. Pass the book work and test. But steel need to work on all of it. As they well if they dive. But not be as good as you think they should be. So no you cant take it away. But you can slap th Pearson that gave it to them, if you wont too.
I have seen some that need a lot more work but. if I saw it that meant they where working on it. Take it away are you sane? Do you knock on there door and ask for there card? Ya right!

 

[Kim]

No .

Quite right.

 

[MikeFerrara]

On a Nitrox thread, someone said that they agree with there being dives in a Nitrox Class because it gives him a chance to correct the students' crummy OW skills. That some students who were even Advanced Certified couldn't even perform Basic OW skills.
My question is...Should an instructor who notices a certified OW or Advanced diver lacking skills, be allowed to "decertify" a diver?

Should a university be able to take your degree away when you botch a project at work?

But hey, If I was able to de-certify all the divers I see with poor skills I could just about clear up the local dive sites on the weekend and have good vis to dive in for a change.

A certification is just that. It's a certificate of completion. It isn't a license and the certifying agency has absolutely no authority.

 

[MikeFerrara]

It should be they can submit a recommendation that the diver be decertified subject to review by other instructors.

How many agencies and instructors are you going to get involved in this. Lots of divers have multiple certifications from multiple agencies.

 

[jonix]

No. The focus should be on making sure new divers are good divers. The solution is to fix the problem not start yanking certs.

i agree with diva-aholic. instructors should set high standards for new divers afterall it's their safety at stake.

I think instead of yanking certs we should just make all crappy divers ride the slow cattle boats and reserve the fast 6 packs for all the good divers. Segregation!

you're so cruel

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

On a Nitrox thread, someone said that they agree with there being dives in a Nitrox Class because it gives him a chance to correct the students' crummy OW skills. That some students who were even Advanced Certified couldn't even perform Basic OW skills.
My question is...Should an instructor who notices a certified OW or Advanced diver lacking skills, be allowed to "decertify" a diver?

If this is allowed, how about another hypothetical scenario --- analogous to the situation in Last Dive --- divers with advanced skills and experience who are observed to do outrageously ill-conceived dives, like diving in horrible sea conditions to 200 ft in unknown overhead dive sites on air (because they couldn't afford better gas). Should their cards be pulled? These situations can put a whole boat, even a coast guard rescue chopper, in jeopardy.

Everyone wants to pick on the clumsy weekend diver, but the so-called skilled divers who push the envelope get a pass. You can practice bad skills ...bad judgement, however, is to the bone, so to speak...

 

[drew52]

Ok. So what if the problem is not training.

Sorry but most of these divers usually complete their courses, do a couple of dives then 2 - 5 years later feel they are ready for that advanced deep dive (or any dive for that matter). Maybe once they could do all the skills, dive with reasonable buoyancy but now they want to dive beyond their training with no refresher course.

You can't really blame their training for this.

Perhaps if more dive centers enforced the refresher course this wouldn't be such a problem. But then I guess most of these people would just lie about when last they dived because after all the refresher is probably some other way LDS's are trying to con them out of money.

We don't need to decertify people, just encourage them to dive more and do some type of skills/diving refresher after periods of inactivity.

 

[Walter]

Why do so many folks want to control other people? Live your own life, let others live theirs.

 

[scubawally]

so here is my 2 cents worth.......

first off any diver can be a train wreck on any given day depending on the circumstances. For instance even the best diver is apt to get a little spooked the first time they see a shark or whale underwater. this nervousness can lead to either panic or it could just cause the diver to forget some of the stuff that they learned in the basic course.

second of all the basic owsd course offered from the LDS will just certify a diver to the point that he/she is safe to enter the water with a buddy and dive to a marginal depth and return to the surface safe. Every diver should constantly strive to improve their skils and increase their training level.

The way that I propose to deal with a diver that seems dangerous/inept underwater is to not dive with that person and tell your friends to not dive with him eventually he will have no one to dive with and them he will have to find an instructor to help him with his skills.

this way there is no yanking of 'c' cards and there is still a chance that they will get the extra help that they need.

besides if we start yanking 'c' cards for poor skills we will ahve to instate the scuba police. If poor skill result in a yanked card what are the penalties for: diving a little deeper than you are rated; losing your buddy underwater; poor equiptment maintainence; etc. etc. etc.



as a side note to the guy that was talking about the rouses last dive. You have to realize that while it is no big deal for someone who is certified now to go to most lds and get a trimix fill it just was not as available back then. It was also prohibitivly (sp.) expensive. Add that to the fact that while trimix diving was starting to become the standard for deep diving, air was still the primary gas mix of choice This accident took place in a time when we were just starting to work out the fine details of what gasses worked best at what depths and what the correct decompression profiles for deep diving should be. In most cases there were no standard decompression table available for trimix diving and each person had to get someone like Dr. Hamilton to specifically 'cut' as set of tables for each specific deptha nd each specific gas mix to be used. This was also done at great expense.