lars2923:It is much better now that PADI have moved towards Prescriptive Teaching.
New Student orders material, studies it, and turns in the reviews. Any questions missed on the reviews are reviewed with the instructor. There are Confined Water sessions which may be done in two evenings and a test. Two days of Open water demonstrations, you can knock out a course in three evenings and two weekend days.
No more lengthy sitting in a room being lectured. Self study, self paced. So much easier than when I took my course.
Cheers,
Lars
Lars is right on this one..Student prepares(watch's video and reads /completes kr's) before start of course so time is used more effectively in classroom.With an organized ,compentent instructor a ow course acad/confined water portion can be easily done in a weekend.Could be done with a Friday night orientation and module 1 presentation.Saturday am do mod's 2-3-4-5..go to pool for 5 hrs..all academics except for final completed and confined water done..Student can come into facility during week for final exam and go over equipment advise /rental needs for following w/e training dives.If any student is not ready they can go into /classroom or pool during next ow course(usually caused by someone who either did not put effort by completing homeworks or is a poor swimmer)..
Granted if instructor is inexperienced and poorly organized this is not an easy task.
All depends on the right instructor.