Has SCUBA training gone too far?

[Aqua-Andy]

This http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/basic-scuba-discussions/478674-c-card-recognition-myth-fact.html thread got me thinking. Have the SCUBA training agencys gone to far? There seams to be a specialty for just about everything you can do while diving. Please don't get me wrong, I have nothing against training diver to enjoy the sport safely it's the over zealous training agencys I have an issue with. Just to pick on SSI for a minute. Boat diving, do you really have to take a class on how to dive off a boat? Under water photography, will I be considered reckless if I don't take this class and dive with a camera? Drysuit diving, this was just a waste of money for me but was a means to an end. Perfect buoyancy, shouldn't they have taught this to you in your open water course? The list goes on and on, Fish ID, recreational wreck diving, navigation, waves tides and currents, altitude diving. If you feel uncomfortable doing any of these thing by all means seek some mentoring or take a class but to have a "certification" for some of these courses is ridiculous. When I purchased my drysuit I was told I would not be able to take my advanced open water with my suit unless I took the cert first. I felt the drysuit class was a total waste of money for me but I did get to do the rest of my advanced cert in comfort. The problem is calling these "certifications" set a precedent and then these courses start to be required to dive in certain situations. I know the certification agencys need to make money and that is done by selling course materials for classes, but it just feels like they are trying to nickle and dime the consumer. I would rather take a "class" with the fellow that runs Backscatter under water photo than a "certification" with a dive shop employee who does not know half as much as the former instructor. If a cert agency comes out with a P-valve cert will I have to take the cert class so I can attach myself to my suits P-valve while on a dive charter? Yes for certain types of diving I think certification should be a requirement to protect dive operators, IE: cave diving, deep diving on mixed gasses, decompression. But for using my compass or taking a picture, I think they have gone a little to far.

 

[Wingy]

I totally agree with you, however, it is up to an individual to decide if they want to pay for a ''specialty''....IMHO you don't need a drift dive or a boat dive specialty but if you want to hand over cash to feel you are competent then go for it. I am not prepared to keep feeding agencies with cash for what experience provides - I am CMAS certified and the specialties don't seem to be a big thing there.

Marketing marketing marketing. Dollars dollars dollars for the agency. Id rather put that money towards more diving and less bits of paper.

 

[BRT]

In just about anything you can wonder about, if you follow the money you will start to understand it. Some people like having the license. They like to be able to say they have qualified. Too many of these people are not actually any good at what they have qualified for. For the rest of us the license is only so we can do what we want to do. Part of the reason for requiring a license (c-card or other license) to do something is for liability reasons. Money, they could lose the lawsuit. If I let someone test drive a car off my lot without them having a drivers license anyone that they damage will sue me because I didn't make sure they were qualified to drive. Part of this becomes self fulfilling. If there were no such thing as a drivers license it wouldn't put the responsibility back on me. Some established auto repair people want licensing for mechanics. Some established tire shops want required training for tire changers. This raises the bar for entry into the businesses and "keeps out the riffraff". The auto dealers in my state have pushed through legislation requiring training to get a dealers license and ongoing training to keep it. Limits the competition. Money! In the case of dive certs, if the certs didn't exist the liability wouldn't exist but the certification money wouldn't be there either. After I learned to mix my own nitrox and studied its effects, good and bad, then I had to pay someone to get the cert so I could use someone else's nitrox. Do you suppose for any recreational diving, 130' or less, it is not safer to use 32%? But once the cert exists if someone dies for any reason while using 32% the dive operator had better have a card number.

Rant over, sorry

 

[emoreira]

Some specialty courses are seldom required. Some people need those courses, some not. Not everything is for everyone.
Certification agencies need a way to make money to survive. They are not there just because you dive, they need an income. If they are not there, sport should not have grown to the current level.
As mentioned before, liability is a major explanation.
in every specialty course some information is valuable, perhaps not for you, perhaps for others yes. I know many people that comes to the dive school where I work that have never before been on board a boat or a ship. I've seen many divers dive for the first time with a drysuit without having done the specialty course with their feet up and the suit full of air, fighting to recover control.
And a final point, a specialty course cost less than one tank shore dive. Not too much.

 

[T.C.]

Have the SCUBA training agencys gone to far? There seams to be a specialty for just about everything you can do while diving.

I agree. When PADI comes out with "Zombie Diver Speciality"...the rea$on why they make mo$t $pecialtie$ become$ clear.

There is one specialty really worth getting: Nitrox. Other than that, it's all about Put Another Dollar In.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

I think that nothing has hurt the sport as much as too much continuing education.

 

[KeithG]

Yes & no.

The underwater basket weaving type courses seem frivolous. Night dive? Really.

But there are still a bunch of "more technical" things that courses are good for. I would not want to teach myself how to dive that trimix stuff and do deep deco dives with staged bottles from just reading the Internet.

 

[Karibelle]

Can't win. Either the conversation is about how poorly trained divers are, or how there are too many course options. Sheesh!

And the Zombie diver - not a "PADI specialty" but rather, a distinctive specialty created by an individual instructor. There are lots of those, and maybe it will be brought into the mainstream. Until then, don't blame the agency for that, blame that creative instructor who found a way to meet the needs and wants of his client base in a fun and innovative way.

 

[scubastingray]

Can't win. Either the conversation is about how poorly trained divers are, or how there are too many course options. Sheesh!

Those aren't mutually exclusive. The initial courses can be brief and not as in-depth as many would like, yet PADI still offers a bunch of classes focusing on minute aspects.



As for the OP, if your AoW didn't want to let you dive dry without the cert, I'd have looked elsewhere. I think that's even one of the electives for AoW. Ouch.


I also find this thread title a little humorous. It reminds me of those silly sidebar ads that say, "Has science gone too far?!" with a clearly photoshopped picture of something freak of nature looking.


Personally, I see value in these courses:
Nitrox, AoW (simply to go on deeper dives with dive ops that require it), the cave certs, and some of the deco theory. I think an advanced wreck diving might tempt me down the line, but I agree that the photo, night, boat, etc are absolutely absurd.

I'll even let you guys in on a little secret. The last 15 dives I did were dry, and I didn't do the cert first .
My buoyancy wasn't great at dive 1, but I'm loads better and know I have the knowledge to improve with experience.

 

[Bob DBF]

Want to make a joke of training?

Just make up a lame class for anything you can think up. One justification may be that OW doesn't cover as much as it did.

As far as I am concerned, this is the reason that people like Darrell Spivey have no respect for training and wind up dead because he thought cave training was just more of the same lame training. Lowering of some standards make it look to some like all standards are lowered.


Bob
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I may be old, but I'm not dead yet.