markmud
Self Reliant Diver--On All Dives.
Hello All,
Brett Gilliam wrote an article in undercurrent.org that was published in January 2015 (Vol. 30, No. 1). His perspective is that of an industry-professional and not an avid recreational diver. However, his overriding point is in-line with my viewpoint. The current certification regimen and endless specialty certs are a joke.
Should Diver Certification Last Forever?: Undercurrent 01/2015
Here are some excerpts from Brett's article:
"Instructors, assistant instructors and divemasters are required to renew annually...and show legitimate evidence of diving activity and student training. But the regular "diver" population is not obligated to any such requirement..."
More Gilliam:
"Let's take a look with an objective perspective. First of all, I don't have the simple answer because it's a multi-faceted issue and will require a fundamental cooperative change of protocol industrywide. But the diving industry is infamous for being unable to implement practical and timely changes to recognize innovations, technological advances, and evolution of diving practices by active participants ... while simultaneously possessing a remarkable ability at times to replicate a camel burying its head in the sand when the "obvious" strikes diving's "leadership" as too controversial and might require them to take an initially unpopular stand on issues that need to be addressed and remediated."
"Again, consider the nearly decade-long war against nitrox and diving computers as one example."
Brett is, I believe, referring to my wife and I in this paragraph:
"Many divers get certified and go on to actively dive and participate regularly. They visit different regions and are exposed to various conditions including currents, restricted visibility, boat diving, deeper diving on drop-off walls, wrecks and caves, and develop practical experience that embeds confidence and competence. They evolve into divers completely capable of independent activity and do not need supervision or control. These divers are not a problem."
And:
"It's the folks who got certified and simply didn't continue the sport who need to be properly identified and vetted for their own good."
The dropout rate:
"Diving suffers from a phenomenal dropout rate. You can argue about it all you want, but it's close to 70 percent within the first 12 to 18 months."
Conclusion in a nutshell--read the full article to get the full Monty:
"What causes diver dropout? A huge reason is training that does not adequately qualify them for confident independent diving. That has to be fixed as well. You are not going to retain customers who have a stressful incident shortly after completing supervised training. Sure, you told them they were qualified divers after they did four 20-minute dives in that sinkhole, lake, warm water Caribbean location or even an aquarium. But when they get a scare in the surf, or a current takes them for a ride like the water slide in an amusement park, they may decide to take up golf or tennis. You cannot make sales of anything except toilet paper to people who get the poop scared out them."
How does this relate to my experience in diving (and my wife's experience):
We both love diving, but we are getting bored with the same old beat-up shallow reefs; or, the struggle to get dive operators to be more proactive and allow skilled divers to dive different sites. We are also tired of the 20 year old "experts" treating us like newbs or Muppets. We are tired of the former housewife with 100 dives and a DM cert treating us as if we were her kids and demanding we set-up our kit as she instructs.
Our Bona Fides:
We are collectively approaching 400 logged dives. We have dived the South Pacific, East Pacific (cold water and warm water), Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, Central America, Fiji, Hawaii, Key Largo to Palm Peach and all points between. We have dived Alpine walls, ceynotes, Florida caverns, Gulf Stream currents, and drift dived places like Cozumel and Cancun. We have dived the Spiegel Grove, Oriskany, Binwood, Ruby E, Yukon, and others--but I can't recall their names. We have dived the Channel Islands. We have dived Monterey and the North Coast. We have dived 48 degree to 85 degree water.
My wife did the full PADI thing and has a Master Scuba Cert (including rescue). I have various certs including a Solo cert. Our gear is maintained by professionals regularly and I have the receipts to prove it.
Too bad all of those certs and experience get us the same greeting when we board a dive boat, which is: "High newb, welcome to our expedition to three Muppet dive sites that are beat-to-hell, shallow, and boring!"
And as usual, when the divemaster climbs out of the water with minimum air (or out-of-air and buddy breathing, yes it did happen) while we have lots of gas, and then he/she states: "Hey, you two are good divers!"
Finally, my point:
Again, Brett's perspective is from an industry viewpoint. Mine is from my personal experience.
However, the two opinions are not divergent. My cert cards are worthless if the industry treats me like a Muppet Diver everywhere I go!
I am willing to work for a certification that means something, even if it means ongoing education and a yearly review of my log book (documented log book with receipts, wet signatures, and/or stamps.)
I know what you Scuba Board pros are thinking: "He must not be a good diver if he writes a post like this."
Yeah, go ahead and think that. But I have friends who are instructors, Tech certified, or have other experience levels that have the same issue. One friend only dives with a close-nit group of techies who charter the whole boat or resort so that they can "dictate" dive sites and dive profiles while in country.
My wife and I are on the way to being dropouts from diving. We are tired of the treatment. We are tired of the bait-n-switch we got with the cert card game.
An idea:
Create a progressive cert system that requires 100 logged (documented) dives, and:
I am willing to do almost anything that gets me diving to my experience and training level.
Otherwise, I will probably drop out of this boring sport!
Golf is probably less expensive and less aggravating!
Hunting is definitely less expensive, even when I don't shoot anything.
markmud
(quitter)
PS: Gilliam's Bona Fides:
"I can hear the denials already, but after 44 years in the industry, including running NAUI and founding the TDI/SDI conglomerate, I've got some unique perspective. I was also invested in resorts, liveaboards, diving cruise ships, publishing and manufacturing. Now my primary focus is consulting on litigation in the diving industry."
Brett Gilliam wrote an article in undercurrent.org that was published in January 2015 (Vol. 30, No. 1). His perspective is that of an industry-professional and not an avid recreational diver. However, his overriding point is in-line with my viewpoint. The current certification regimen and endless specialty certs are a joke.
Should Diver Certification Last Forever?: Undercurrent 01/2015
Here are some excerpts from Brett's article:
"Instructors, assistant instructors and divemasters are required to renew annually...and show legitimate evidence of diving activity and student training. But the regular "diver" population is not obligated to any such requirement..."
More Gilliam:
"Let's take a look with an objective perspective. First of all, I don't have the simple answer because it's a multi-faceted issue and will require a fundamental cooperative change of protocol industrywide. But the diving industry is infamous for being unable to implement practical and timely changes to recognize innovations, technological advances, and evolution of diving practices by active participants ... while simultaneously possessing a remarkable ability at times to replicate a camel burying its head in the sand when the "obvious" strikes diving's "leadership" as too controversial and might require them to take an initially unpopular stand on issues that need to be addressed and remediated."
"Again, consider the nearly decade-long war against nitrox and diving computers as one example."
Brett is, I believe, referring to my wife and I in this paragraph:
"Many divers get certified and go on to actively dive and participate regularly. They visit different regions and are exposed to various conditions including currents, restricted visibility, boat diving, deeper diving on drop-off walls, wrecks and caves, and develop practical experience that embeds confidence and competence. They evolve into divers completely capable of independent activity and do not need supervision or control. These divers are not a problem."
And:
"It's the folks who got certified and simply didn't continue the sport who need to be properly identified and vetted for their own good."
The dropout rate:
"Diving suffers from a phenomenal dropout rate. You can argue about it all you want, but it's close to 70 percent within the first 12 to 18 months."
Conclusion in a nutshell--read the full article to get the full Monty:
"What causes diver dropout? A huge reason is training that does not adequately qualify them for confident independent diving. That has to be fixed as well. You are not going to retain customers who have a stressful incident shortly after completing supervised training. Sure, you told them they were qualified divers after they did four 20-minute dives in that sinkhole, lake, warm water Caribbean location or even an aquarium. But when they get a scare in the surf, or a current takes them for a ride like the water slide in an amusement park, they may decide to take up golf or tennis. You cannot make sales of anything except toilet paper to people who get the poop scared out them."
How does this relate to my experience in diving (and my wife's experience):
We both love diving, but we are getting bored with the same old beat-up shallow reefs; or, the struggle to get dive operators to be more proactive and allow skilled divers to dive different sites. We are also tired of the 20 year old "experts" treating us like newbs or Muppets. We are tired of the former housewife with 100 dives and a DM cert treating us as if we were her kids and demanding we set-up our kit as she instructs.
Our Bona Fides:
We are collectively approaching 400 logged dives. We have dived the South Pacific, East Pacific (cold water and warm water), Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, Central America, Fiji, Hawaii, Key Largo to Palm Peach and all points between. We have dived Alpine walls, ceynotes, Florida caverns, Gulf Stream currents, and drift dived places like Cozumel and Cancun. We have dived the Spiegel Grove, Oriskany, Binwood, Ruby E, Yukon, and others--but I can't recall their names. We have dived the Channel Islands. We have dived Monterey and the North Coast. We have dived 48 degree to 85 degree water.
My wife did the full PADI thing and has a Master Scuba Cert (including rescue). I have various certs including a Solo cert. Our gear is maintained by professionals regularly and I have the receipts to prove it.
Too bad all of those certs and experience get us the same greeting when we board a dive boat, which is: "High newb, welcome to our expedition to three Muppet dive sites that are beat-to-hell, shallow, and boring!"
And as usual, when the divemaster climbs out of the water with minimum air (or out-of-air and buddy breathing, yes it did happen) while we have lots of gas, and then he/she states: "Hey, you two are good divers!"
Finally, my point:
Again, Brett's perspective is from an industry viewpoint. Mine is from my personal experience.
However, the two opinions are not divergent. My cert cards are worthless if the industry treats me like a Muppet Diver everywhere I go!
I am willing to work for a certification that means something, even if it means ongoing education and a yearly review of my log book (documented log book with receipts, wet signatures, and/or stamps.)
I know what you Scuba Board pros are thinking: "He must not be a good diver if he writes a post like this."
Yeah, go ahead and think that. But I have friends who are instructors, Tech certified, or have other experience levels that have the same issue. One friend only dives with a close-nit group of techies who charter the whole boat or resort so that they can "dictate" dive sites and dive profiles while in country.
My wife and I are on the way to being dropouts from diving. We are tired of the treatment. We are tired of the bait-n-switch we got with the cert card game.
An idea:
Create a progressive cert system that requires 100 logged (documented) dives, and:
- A multi-faceted system where divers get ongoing training, or certified experience up to 100 dives. This multi faceted system will be flexible, so that divers who regularly dive with instructors or DMs, can get credit for non-instruction dives as long as the DM or instructor witnesses good technique and knowledge. OW divers with 100 logged dives who can't prove ongoing supervised dives will need to take the "full Master Scuba Cert Course."
- Once the prerequisite experience is obtained and a true Master Cert earned, a diver will need to maintain that cert annually, which includes a refresher of the basics. If the diver has logged 15 or 20 open water dives, fully documented, during the previous year, then the recert requirement is very basic. Otherwise, the diver with no or very few truly documentable dives (receipts and signed log by DM, instructor, buddy, Captain, and/or Company stamp) will be required to take an extensive refresher course in order to maintain the "Master Scuba Cert level."
- And for the DM or operator who ignores this cert: keel-haul-em!
I am willing to do almost anything that gets me diving to my experience and training level.
Otherwise, I will probably drop out of this boring sport!
Golf is probably less expensive and less aggravating!
Hunting is definitely less expensive, even when I don't shoot anything.
markmud
(quitter)
PS: Gilliam's Bona Fides:
"I can hear the denials already, but after 44 years in the industry, including running NAUI and founding the TDI/SDI conglomerate, I've got some unique perspective. I was also invested in resorts, liveaboards, diving cruise ships, publishing and manufacturing. Now my primary focus is consulting on litigation in the diving industry."