The Road to Pro

[MacFinn]

Guys.

I would like to rack your brains and collective experience. I'm planning to leave the UK to SE Asia to become a diving professional. The plan so far is to find a good dive school and train to be a DM and then onto Instructor level.

However, I have encountered a couple of pretty significant points:

1. Many schools, particularly in SE Asia run Advanced Open Water -> Instructor courses. Are these designed to churn out students and make maximum profit (I'm aware busiensses need to make money)? What would be the likelyhood of securing employment as a DM / Instructor after graduating from such an operation (even a 5star or CDC)? Many schools say they will try to get me a job in one of their branches after graduating. Are they just saying this to get me enrolled?

2. Smaller operations offer to train you to DM in exchange for my services in their operation. This would involve working in a Dive school for a season (for no pay), but gaining experience from it. At least this would guarantee a season's experiece where option 1. might not.

It is very difficult to get sound advice from schools as they have their own agendas (making money from me or getting free services from me).

What is in your opinions the best path to become a good Divemaster / Instructor?

Thanks for your help

Mac

[theslyfox01]

you could do it in the UK, divers qualified in non-bathtub conditions tend to have a good reputation as divers because they have been subjected to more challenging diving, though I imagine the attraction of doing it overseas was the warmth in the first place, and the cost advantages you can sometimes get thrown in.

I personally dont like the idea of A.O.W through to instructor because your getting to instructor with the bare minimum dives under your belt, and often bare minimum time actually instructing. From what I saw in Thailand recently most of the instructors had come qualified from abroad, where as lots of the DM's had trained locally and were working at the shop they were trained at (which is the norm as you said) as for if they ever get the opportunity to get paid for instructing... well thats the big question and I honestly don't know

[chiara]

theslyfox01 once bubbled...
From what I saw in Thailand recently most of the instructors had come qualified from abroad, where as lots of the DM's had trained locally and were working at the shop they were trained at (which is the norm as you said) as for if they ever get the opportunity to get paid for instructing... well thats the big question and I honestly don't know

Don't forget some of the locally trained people are locals to start with, and particularly in Thailand, with low wages even a cheap course might turn out to be too expensive for them.

One of my best buddies ever is Thai, he's an AI and is scraping and saving for IDC and IE, despite a non-working wife and two kids.

I like the idea of a non-paid internship better, you might even get fringe benefits such as very low or non-existent rental fees.