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View Poll Results: Who should have to renew? and what level are you?
Voters
47. You may not vote on this poll
Renewal for Instructor and Diver Certification All Levels
I think that businesses that value and differentiate themselves based on a reputation for excellence should hold themselves to high standards and make those standards public. Obviously, GUE thinks this is a sound business strategy and I applaud them for it. I also think consumers who want a quality product should examine the reputations and standards of the businesses they patronize. And I strongly feel that communities (like the "dive community") should keep their noses out of the business of the individuals within them as much as possible. The more the dive community interferes on behalf of my safety, the more likely I am to take up sailing as my primary diversion.
I think we need to take a bigger view of the issue. The recertification idea carries sounds great but makes a few assumptions that are most likely not correct.
1. An active instructor is not neccesarily a good one. in fact pressure to generate student numbers can get the opposite effect with instructors recruiting minimally interested students and pushing them through a course to meet a quota. And it is a further disincentive for instrucotrs and LDSs to spread an OW course out over several weeks, take it slow and do a better job of instructing. Finally, I'd argue that if an instructor is truly qualified (ie. has excellent in water skills AND can actually efferctively and efficiently impart thse skills to others) they will maintain that ability whether they teach on student a year or 100 students per year.
2. An active diver, diving to the maximum level of their training to meet a quota is not always safer than an active diver who just dives a lot. I am a cave diver and while I am certified to dive in caves, do cave dives involving complex navigation, stage and deco gasses and to do so below recreational depths, not every cave dive I do should be to that maximum limit. And while the skills are perishable, they can be effectively maintained with application and/or practice at shallower depths and lesser pentrations.
3. Currency quotas can have a paradoxical effect. As Trace pointed out earlier, meeting a quota can provide an incentive for divers to dive outside their comfort or ability levels when the opportunity arises - on days when they may not be prepared to meet the demands of that dive, but are pressured to do so by the rest of the team needing to meet the quota. What matters is not that the diver frequently does dives to their maximum certified limits, but rather that they maintain the skills needed to do it and then, before they do it, that they knock off any rust and work up to that pinnacle level of performance. That is an entirely separate issue than having x number of dives in x number of years.
4. Rules won't cure stupid or improve poor judgement. It does not matter whether a diver has a "current" cert. What matters is that the diver knows and respects their abilities and limitations and dives within them. That involves making a personal committment to ensuring their skills are current enough to meet the demands of any dive they are undertaking and working back up to that level of proficiency if their skills have slipped. A diver does not magically get worse at, for example, 3 years post cert. Their skills are no better at 2 years 364 days than they will be at 2 years 366 days.
5. A requirement for diver recertification will not solve the "divers with poor skills" problem. Poor instructors and poor LDSs turn out poor divers and if you impose a recert requirment, guess who will be doing the recertification.
6. Increasing the cost of initial certification will not keep out the less interested. It will keep out those with less money, so the remaining poor divers will have higher average incomes, not higher than average interest. Adding a recert requirement will just add another financial burden and reduce the anount of real diving a diver can afford to do. The dive industry is already badly skewed by the dive travel industry and local diving has all but dried up in most areas. The result is a large number of divers who only dive on 1-2 trips per year.
7. If you really want better divers, you need higher levels of currency and skills proficiency and promoting local diving is the most effective way to achieve that. So instead of focusing efforts on recertifcation, focus efforts on the local dive shops, local clubs and the social side of diving to encourage more people to get in local water more often to develop and maintain skills.
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For pilots with less than a specified number of hours, the FAA mandates a bi-ennial flight review. This involves some instruction every two where a flight instructor essentially evaluates your skills and essentially signs off that you still meet minimum standards. For an active pilot this might inovlve one hour of instruction. For a less active pilot in need od substantial skills refreshing, it may involve several hours of instruction.
Just as importantly, once certain certification levels and/or experience levels are reached, the requirement no longer applies. The underlying assumption of the BFR exception is that once you reach certain training and/or experience levels, you ought to know enough to fly within your limits and to know when/if you need some refresher training.
The FAA also has some minimum currency requirements such as a 3 take offs and landings in the last 90 days before carrying passengers and a similar requirement for night flights.
A combination approach is used to maintain currency for instrument flight with the bulk of the responsibility staying with the pilot with instruction only coming into play after an extended period of inactivity.
In a sense, some operators in the scuba industry use the same approach - resorts that require X number of dives in the last year or boat captains who may review a divers certs and logs to determine both training level and currency before taking a diver to a specific wreck. In my opinion, that type of approach makes far more sense than arbitrary quotas and time limits.
For pilots with less than a specified number of hours, the FAA mandates a bi-ennial flight review. This involves some instruction every two where a flight instructor essentially evaluates your skills and essentially signs off that you still meet minimum standards. For an active pilot this might inovlve one hour of instruction. For a less active pilot in need od substantial skills refreshing, it may involve several hours of instruction.
Just as importantly, once certain certification levels and/or experience levels are reached, the requirement no longer applies. The underlying assumption of the BFR exception is that once you reach certain training and/or experience levels, you ought to know enough to fly within your limits and to know when/if you need some refresher training.
The FAA also has some minimum currency requirements such as a 3 take offs and landings in the last 90 days before carrying passengers and a similar requirement for night flights.
A combination approach is used to maintain currency for instrument flight with the bulk of the responsibility staying with the pilot with instruction only coming into play after an extended period of inactivity.
My 1ste thought was no i will not do it and it will let diving go down hill, because who are going to want to go through the trouble every year to take the time and effort to go and do it, we all know how vallueble time are. .
Then i got the positive site of renewing cards (havent read the previous posts, so i hope my idea is unique) . .
If they use the money of the renewing cards and spent it on a education in schools and the public over the world on the ocean and the enviroment of the ocean e.g fishes, reefs, sharks, global warmings effect on the ocean and its enviroment. . Then it can work. .
It will be good though if all the agencies can work together just for this one cause, even the tec side. . Then they can work for one mission and vision and try and make a differance in the ocean so that there will still be a ocean one day for the next generation to enjoy. .
Like I wrote..requiring a renewal for both instructors and rec divers would increase the costs of doing business and instructors can make more money to a point it would be worth it to maintain proficiency.Many of us treat teaching professionally and expect to be paid for it.If not making money why do it? Just go diving and enjoy yourself and do not bother with teaching.
Make it a requirement it that the instructor who teaches less than 10/15 people a year has to do a refresher semi-annually with a course director/IDC staff instructor .
Something you should keep in mind is that not everyone works the same way you do. Most club-based instructors (including most of the BSAC) aren't paid at all for instructing, and are doing it for the love of the sport. If you teach long course with small class sizes, having numerical quotas could also not be an accurate representation of actual currency. It also has the interesting side-effect of increasing the working expenses for the very instructors who could least afford it, as their income is lower. (assuming any income at all, that is) This is pretty much an economic incentive for running c-card mills....
Something you should keep in mind is that not everyone works the same way you do. Most club-based instructors (including most of the BSAC) aren't paid at all for instructing, and are doing it for the love of the sport. If you teach long course with small class sizes, having numerical quotas could also not be an accurate representation of actual currency. It also has the interesting side-effect of increasing the working expenses for the very instructors who could least afford it, as their income is lower. (assuming any income at all, that is) This is pretty much an economic incentive for running c-card mills....
At the DM / Instructor level it is a business.To maintain certification to teach is a cost of doing business.
Does not matter if you are an independent or work for a LDS.Why do something that takes you away from family and your life for no pay? Why do something that if there is a screwup/accident you can loose your life style?
If you wish to teach for the "love of the sport" that is great. But for those that do it for an occupation it is a job. As a business and job they are entitled to make money at their choice of occupation. Again it goes to how often an instructor teaches a class.More likely if the instructor teaches often he/she would develop superior skills at teaching in both the water and classroom environment, just as a ow diver gets better by diving often...If a "club" instructor teaches one class a year they may be very good,but chances are that very often may be unlikely.He may be able to get the student to complete skills but may take a longer period of time to do it. Why teach a 40 hour academic/confined water course when it can take 18 hours with an experienced instructor who is clear with classroom presentations and skill demo's and come out with the same end product?
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Originally Posted by DA Aquamaster
