BC's come in so many configurations with different types of straps, clips, weight pockets, releases and whatever other garbage the toy companies can think up to put on them, just exactly what is standard or "conventional"? The wing itself, is of course, just a bag with a power inflator and operates just like the ones on a "conventional" BC except they usually don't have 40 different dumps that nobody needs. How can using a simple harness and plate complicate the teaching process? Some of these instructors just aren't thinking things through.
As for air donation, with air2 type gadgets being popular donating the primary isn't anything unusual. I donate the primary and put my backup on a necklace. I always showed students other configurations but I'm pretty convinced that this works the best and it's what I put students in too, so we were all using the same thing.
I know this idea of pinning the alternate in the "golden triangle" someplace is popular but that doesn't make it consistant, dependable, streamline or...good. Everyone puts them in a little different place, in a little different kind of clip. They free flow, get handed off upside down, come loose and dangle, are sometimes hard to find in a hurry, either hard to unclip or hard to restow and all those hoses that are too long and poorly routed make big drag inducing and unsightly loops. It's a mess and even new divers are usually quick to see the problems with it when shown an alternative.
The real issue here is, who is going to buy all the pretty colored toys on the dive shop shelves if we're all using a simple harness (a couple bucks worth of weight belt webbing) to hold our plate and wing on and $0.25 worth of shock cord to hold our backups (which are real regs)?
