elvisisalive-
Fair criticisms all. Let me try to explain my perspective a little further. I came to Fundies with about 30 dives, decent trim and buoyancy, and having spent a day with my instructor a year prior. My class was four people, two (including me) aiming for rec passes, two who'd taken Fundies before and who were aiming for tech passes. I really hoped to pass, because I did not have any prior nitrox cert and didn't want to spend the money/time to get one via another agency, but knew that I might not pass and was ok with that. (As you correctly point out, the nitrox cert does add some value, although I am the only person I've ever heard of who actually uses their GUE card as their sole nitrox cert).
I came into the class expecting to get my buoyancy and trim sorted out, and it certainly improved those. But what I mostly got out of the class was team skills: how to communicate, how (and when) to act as a depth reference vs. when to stay with the team, the use of a canister light (which my instructor lent me halfway through the course to allow me better communication, since I had felt "voiceless" before that), team positioning, and so forth. By mid-way through class, my b&t were well within a tech standard, and yet I felt and still feel that I learned a ton precisely because my teammates were not all perfect all the time. Is it easier to get a tech pass when your teammate can act as a perfect visual reference at every stop? Of course. Do you learn more when you have to hold stops with a teammate on a long hose holding a 5 foot buoyancy window? I think so. You learn to take charge when necessary, to follow when necessary, to signal when necessary, to take on more than your "fair share" of duties when necessary. Thus from a learning perspective, I think mixed teams of rec- and tech-level divers can be ideal. And I loved my team and had a great time, even though we'd all just met.
So for me at least, Fundamentals was primarily about team. The card was worth something ($125 to be precise, the cost of a nitrox course from my LDS), but since I had no plans to continue on at that time, it simply didn't matter. At the time, I was moderately worked up about needing to pass, but really the card meant and means nothing--in the sense that it qualified me for no dives I couldn't do before and for no class. Yet it meant a lot symbolically, which is why I think people get so worked up about it. And I don't mean to imply that the card's symbolic value is meaningless. One of the best parts of GUE to me is entry into a community. I'm quite sure that the people whom I've set up dives with in far flung corners of the world, sight-unseen, would still have dove with me had I not had the card. But the pass indicated to them that I had some minimum level of proficiency, and without that signal I suspect the dives we undertook would have been a bit less challenging and had a bit more of a mentorship aspect to them.
Finally, I was speaking of no one in particular when I painted a caricature of the diver kitted out in doubles who has been practicing for months and expects a tech pass. It does seem that this ideal gets thrown around, and I have heard tales of those who really truly viewed Fundies as an extended exam. Kind of unfortunate in my mind. I really do think Fundies is best taken when you still have something to learn from it, and treat the exam part as secondary.
Fair criticisms all. Let me try to explain my perspective a little further. I came to Fundies with about 30 dives, decent trim and buoyancy, and having spent a day with my instructor a year prior. My class was four people, two (including me) aiming for rec passes, two who'd taken Fundies before and who were aiming for tech passes. I really hoped to pass, because I did not have any prior nitrox cert and didn't want to spend the money/time to get one via another agency, but knew that I might not pass and was ok with that. (As you correctly point out, the nitrox cert does add some value, although I am the only person I've ever heard of who actually uses their GUE card as their sole nitrox cert).
I came into the class expecting to get my buoyancy and trim sorted out, and it certainly improved those. But what I mostly got out of the class was team skills: how to communicate, how (and when) to act as a depth reference vs. when to stay with the team, the use of a canister light (which my instructor lent me halfway through the course to allow me better communication, since I had felt "voiceless" before that), team positioning, and so forth. By mid-way through class, my b&t were well within a tech standard, and yet I felt and still feel that I learned a ton precisely because my teammates were not all perfect all the time. Is it easier to get a tech pass when your teammate can act as a perfect visual reference at every stop? Of course. Do you learn more when you have to hold stops with a teammate on a long hose holding a 5 foot buoyancy window? I think so. You learn to take charge when necessary, to follow when necessary, to signal when necessary, to take on more than your "fair share" of duties when necessary. Thus from a learning perspective, I think mixed teams of rec- and tech-level divers can be ideal. And I loved my team and had a great time, even though we'd all just met.
So for me at least, Fundamentals was primarily about team. The card was worth something ($125 to be precise, the cost of a nitrox course from my LDS), but since I had no plans to continue on at that time, it simply didn't matter. At the time, I was moderately worked up about needing to pass, but really the card meant and means nothing--in the sense that it qualified me for no dives I couldn't do before and for no class. Yet it meant a lot symbolically, which is why I think people get so worked up about it. And I don't mean to imply that the card's symbolic value is meaningless. One of the best parts of GUE to me is entry into a community. I'm quite sure that the people whom I've set up dives with in far flung corners of the world, sight-unseen, would still have dove with me had I not had the card. But the pass indicated to them that I had some minimum level of proficiency, and without that signal I suspect the dives we undertook would have been a bit less challenging and had a bit more of a mentorship aspect to them.
Finally, I was speaking of no one in particular when I painted a caricature of the diver kitted out in doubles who has been practicing for months and expects a tech pass. It does seem that this ideal gets thrown around, and I have heard tales of those who really truly viewed Fundies as an extended exam. Kind of unfortunate in my mind. I really do think Fundies is best taken when you still have something to learn from it, and treat the exam part as secondary.
