Hello from DC-ish and a question about AOW certification

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

DancinDiver

Registered
Messages
34
Reaction score
17
Location
DelMarVa
# of dives
200 - 499
Hi all,

My fiance and I have been lurking on SB for a few months now, and finally decided to introduce ourselves. We're in the greater Washington, DC area. We've been OW certified (PADI) for about three years, mostly diving in the Florida Keys around Marathon. We recently decided to get our AOW certification after having a fanastic trip to Maui.

However, as we work through the AOW book, we both find ourselves incredibly disappointed. Instead of the expansion of skill sets I was expecting, I find a lot of rehashing of skills I already know, and a bunch of "specialty" padding that seems like fluff.

I had a few specific skills I wanted out of this course; how to rig and use a pony bottle, the risks of an overhead environment and how to handle it in an emergency (I'm thinking of swim-throughs), and how and when to deploy SMBs. Most of these I only know from discussions at my LDS and from reading threads here. Heck, the only reason I know I need a reel with my SMB is from SB, not from any of my training material. I want to go and experience these skills first in an environment where I have help from an experienced professional.

Is this typical for dive training? We're spending a significant amount of money for a "certification" that feels like it's just a toll we have to pay to move on to the stuff we really want. Is the AOW-equivalent cert for other dive training agencies more informative? Once we complete this, could we switch? If so, to whom? Would it be worth it?

If this is the way of the dive world, then so be it…we'll suck it up and pay the $$s. But if there's a better way and we can jump to another agency without being back at square one…well, we will seriously consider it.

Cheers!
DnD (and fiance)
 
Last edited:
It is not the way of the dive world. Well not all of it. Much of it though is along those lines. There are those of us who do not teach the agency by the book courses. I wrote my own advanced level classes that do include all you are looking for and more in fact and got sei to approve it.

Another difference with mine and others is we have minimum skill sets you need to have before starting the class and, at least with mine, you can fail the class. Training is guaranteed. Certification is earned. The class I offer is outlined in my book briefly and if you send me a pm with your email I'll send you the full outline. You can use it to shop around and compare content.

Along with the standard class, I tailor courses to include those things you want to work on. It's not as cheap as some aow classes, but I guarantee you get your money's worth. My philosophy is that card gives you access to dives with more risk, and possibly more serious consequences if things go bad so you damn well better have the skills to deal with that. Including rescue skills. Those are included in the class.

It's also my name on your card as the instructor. I'm not going to send a diver out with them reflecting anything other than the highest skills and education I can give them.

You would not need to start over. You might need some remediation but we'd find that out in the pool or on a dive at no charge to you. If you did it would be clearly explained and a course of action to do that outlined. It might mean an extra couple days at some cost but again I'd guarantee you'd get your money's worth.
 
The reality is that the AOW c-card will be required by many ops to do some of the dives you want to do. What you get from earning that cert depends on the chosen instructor and you. +1 to the comments above. You could choose to go pfft and breeze the cert with a slack instructor to just get the card. Sad, but many do. Or you could choose to get some value for your time and money within the constraints imposed by the course. That is all up to you.

Other than that, you should ask yourself what you are looking for - certifications or skills. They really aren't the same.

Many good instructors - like Jim - will actually put together a training package for you that addresses YOUR needs. No c-card though.
 
Good advice from all. Like it has been said, the AOW course varies depending on who is teaching it. As a DM who assisted on many AOW classes, I was shocked at what passed for the Peak Performance Buoyancy dives and by what they called a wreck dive, which was essentially a guided tour of the outside of a wreck that prepares you for absolutely nothing. How can you be classified as an advanced diver if you can't even control your buoyancy and keep yourself from finning up a sandstorm? But divers like that routinely are passed for AOW.

You are not by any means tied to your initial certifying agency. In fact, I would encourage you to look outside your original agency and see what other styles of teaching, course topics, etc. are out there.

I strongly second Decompression's recommendation of Submerged in Rockville, MD. I switched over to UTD and took my courses with Submerged after being a DM with Padi for over 3 years, with hundreds of dives, and was blown away by the skills I learned. UTD doesn't sell cards and doesn't add fluff to their courses. As long as you are willing to work and making progress, you can continue to work towards your certification if you don't pass the first time. They turn out competent and confident divers that look amazing in the water. Stop by there sometime or email them to see what they might be able to offer you as far as real training goes.
 
Thank you for the suggestons. What I seem to be hearing is that we will need the certification training (fluff and all) to get the cert card. But in order to learn the actual skills we should plan for a more thorough training class that may or may not provide a certification if we pass. As we've already committed to the AOW class, we can accept this for the moment.

For the future, I guess I should take a step back and revise my expectations of my certifying agency. I think I'll use my time investigating a skills class to also look into other agencies. If I can get future certifications without having to pay twice, that would be a huge benefit, especially as we're doing this as a couple.

I assume there wouldn't be any issues getting c-cards from other agencies accepted by dive ops. But you what they say about when you assume…

- DnD
 
There are a lot of threads here where the value and content of the AOW course has been debated. You might do a search for some of those to get some interesting perspectives.
 
The AOW class in PADI's curriculum, despite its name, is designed as a close follow-on to OW. The assumption is that the diver taking it is still pretty new, so the class is not really a skills addition or even refinement class, but more of a skills consolidation experience.

But although I am a PADI divemaster and my husband is a PADI instructor, I have to say that the PADI class sequence is not designed as a major challenge to students. With the exception of Rescue, I don't think most PADI classes would leave students feeling as though they had to "give it all they had" to reach the standard. If you're that sort of student, there are better places to land. I was lucky enough to be referred to a GUE Fundamentals class when I had about 60 dives -- there's a class where you will learn to shoot an SMB, and furthermore, you'll be expected to do so while maintaining your buoyancy, trim, position, and team awareness. NW Grateful Diver's AOW class will challenge most any recreational diver (I still shudder thinking of the midwater navigation dive). My husband teaches a Techreational class (a PADI distinctive specialty that he wrote himself, modeled upon Fundies). I would imagine that Jim Lapenta's class is also in the same category.

Once you have decided you want more challenging and in-depth training, you either have to choose your instructor carefully, or choose an agency that reliably provides that type of training.
 
Welcome to Scubaboard... or at least no longer lurking!

Ray
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/teric/

Back
Top Bottom