The "Official" SB Scuba Course?

[Kingpatzer]

Hey guys.

I see a huge amount of discussion on this board about what should or should not be taught within a scuba course. There's a lot of questions about what is necessary skills and what isn't. There is, in short, a huge variability in thoughts on how OW should be taught.

I'm wondering if there would be interest in a group effort to design an open format scuba curriculum? A consensus of content, methodologies, closed and open water skills, and the like?

It might be nothing more than an intellectual exercise, but if completed, maybe it would be an idea that could catch on with one or more agencies -- a curriculum built the way Wikipedia and other open sites are built -- with the wisdom of the masses driving the effort?

If anyone's interested in starting this, I'd love to help make it real. I'm in the process of building out a small blog for my own enjoyment, and have the room to toss a wiki and Moodle onto the server.

So, anyone want to step up and do more than complain about the existing training options and see what can really be done in a marketable short format modular course? Something that could be implemented in a way that could legitimately be seen as a market competitor to PADI?

[NetDoc]

There was an interesting thread started in the Agency Q&A and I thought I would like to see what just the INSTRUCTORS could make of it. Here you go! The original thread can be found HERE!

[leapfrog]

Has this been censored? A number of posts between WebMonkey, girldiverllc and me are missing?

[OceanEd]

There will be a large difference between what we theoretically would like to see as the ideal entry level course and what is actually practical and can be done. The great diving between the two is created because people will normally not sign up for a course when it is too long or complicated. That is why almost all the diving organizations have a minimum standard for the entry level course.

I have taught for a number of diving organizations over the years and trained instructors for 3 organizations. What I have learned is that there are many, many ideas as to what the ideal course should be.

At the end of the day one of our most important criteria has to be the accident statistics which will follow, year after year, once people take your proposed course. If the accident statistics prove that course is safe then you have your first major requirement fulfilled, no matter what the difference is in what is being taught.

A second criteria for whether or not you have reached your goal in designing a course is whether or not the majority of the people are still diving one and two years after certification. If the course does not give people enough skills/experience/confidence to continue diving without being under instruction at the time you will loose a lot of them. This can tell you a lot about your course.

A third criteria has to be that your course meets (legal phrase here) "the standard of care in your community". Whatever you design, it is imperative that the good instructors in your area, no matter what agency they represent, would be able to come into court and say that they would do what you did during that class. If you can not meet this "care" then you will not have a prayer of winning a court case and your course will never be able to have an insurance company insure the instructors to teach.

You also want to design the course with standard training materials that include books, knowledge reviews, quizzes, final exam, and AV materials. The reason for this is that you can then guarantee that the student received all the information at least once and usually 3 or 4 times even if the instructor did not directly cover it. This method helps teach by repetition as well as give you great liability protection in a court of law.

I love your premise, and I am not even goiing to begin to get into the actual standards for such a course, but I wanted to give you some benchmarks to consider when you design it.