How happy are you with today's level of Diver Education?

[OldNSalty]

I can say that for sure more pool time would be beneficial and I love the idea of 2 more dives, monitored but not lead dives. I know when I first got certified I contacted a few of the people in my class to try and find a dive buddy the next weekend. 1 told me that he just wasn't comfortable making an unsupervised dive and would only dive if there was a DM with us.

As for the class room-you could expand the knowledge to make a more well-rounded diver. Maybe include a real course on how your gear really works, maybe more on the local wild life but for sure you could benefit from more hours in the pool.

I have to say, one thing I loved about my intro course was that after the 2nd class you could come in anytime, grab some gear out of the rental shop and jump in the pool. I thought that was a great idea.

If I was re-designing the courses, I think I would also make the swim requirement be taken up front, maybe even before you atually pay for the course. I only say this becasue for us, we took it probably 2/3 of the way in or more. I suspect that they weren't going to fail anyone at that point.

 

[JeffG]

I am confused about this kind of statement, mostly made by a specific handful of SB'ers. Where, when and how many "one weekend PADI classes" have you seen?

Every yr, 1 store in Edmonton has around 6 sessions. Somewhere around 10-12 divers and a couple of instructors.

The entire confined water and classroom work is done over a Saturday and Sunday. The checkout dives are not included in the 2 days.


See Section: What about Weekend Programs in one, two or three days?

http://www.oceansports.ca/scubalessons/generalinformation.html

Here's their schedule. 8 weekend sessions. (my bad..I said 6)

http://www.oceansports.ca/scubalessons/scubalessongrid.html


tee hee...It sucks to be wrong.

IMHO, 2-day PADI classes that produce OW certification only exist in the imaginations of the PADI bashers. The only way I will believe differently is if links are published to actual 2-day OW classes being offered.

 

[Thalassamania]

Each of us may have been at dive sites, or on charter boats where other divers are present. Perhaps some of us have been "buddied-up" with strangers.

How competent (in your opinion) are today's new divers?

They are not Competent ... Beginner at best, but we seem to have a slew of instuctors here on the board who believe that an O/W Certification is, "only a learner's permit" and neither demands or represents Competence.

Do you feel that the average diver being certified today is capable of looking after himself and his/her buddy in the water?

No.

Could today's training courses be improved? If so would shortening or lengthening the SCUBA program produce better results?

Overall I guess lengthened, but that is really dependent upon the aptitude of the student(s), the number in the class and many other factors. All in all I think that the objectives of O/W programs need to be redefined so that the skill level demanded of the students is about that produced by an efficient and well run 6 dive, 40 hour program.

 

[The Chairman]

The truth is somewhere inbetween. Maybe a good instructor can make a "bad" student a good diver, but I would hazard a guess that a "good" student will succeed regardless of the instructor.

Amen, Brother G!

There is a broad spectrum of who think what is needed in an OW course. Underwater tourists might care less about the process: they want to see pretty fishies. The underwater enthusiast sees diving as adventure as well as a means to an end. Then there are those who are simply enamored with the act of diving. The means and the end are the same, with some cool looking fishies thrown in as a bonus.

The underwater tourists want a completely different level of course than the other two. I would suggest that some want a course with a much lower bar than the laxest course out there. That doesn't make it right or wrong: it's just what they really want. As Jeff pointed out, these types of people tend to retain their training only long enough to get their card. Heck they might even have some valuable skills retained, but they just don't know when to use them.

As a Scuba Instructor, I have to weigh their desires against their safety. Rather than teach to the lowest denominator, I make a game out of the process so that they are learning while having lots of fun, with no wasted time. It's my job to pull the reluctant learners in or to not pass them.

On the other hand, trying to foist a tougher or longer than needed class on someone simply because you want to is silly. It could even be dangerous! Those who want to learn more will, and great instructors introduce their students to forums such as ScubaBoard early on where they can be mentored and inspired by a number of seasoned divers.

 

[boulderjohn]

The truth is somewhere inbetween. Maybe a good instructor can make a "bad" student a good diver, but I would hazard a guess that a "good" student will succeed regardless of the instructor.

Actually, Jeff, you have hit on an important principle of modern educational theory.

Many students will succeed with whatever educational approach the instructor brings to the table. That is why teachers with very poor technique in many affluent high schools and colleges still have "good" track records as far as turning out students who go on to succeed is concerned. When a student comes along whose learning needs do not match the teacher's teaching style, the student fails and that instructor thinks nothing of it. "Not my fault."

Skilled teachers adopt their teaching to match the learning needs of the student. If what they are doing is not working, they try something else.

Studies of students with identified learning needs shows that they perform better when certain instructional strategies are used. Interestingly enough, if you compare the recommended strategies for different learning needs, you find that many of the same strategies work across the board. In fact, if the students who are succeeding anyway were taught with these methods, they would also learn better and achieve more. The "successful" students are able to overcome weak teaching and reach a certain level of competence; the unsuccessful ones cannot.

Unfortunately, these successful strategies are not the strategies traditionally used in education.

 

[vinegarbiscuit]

Looking at my own diving education - which went perfectly smoothly with no hiccups - I think it was completely inadequete. There was only so much my instructor could teach in such a short time (classes and pool work over two weeks and six straight days of open-water diving). But it took a little more experience and a few more certifications for me to see how woefully unprepared I was "back then". Looking back, I'm frankly terrified how incompetant I was. How blithely I went into the water...and yet, how utterly unprepared I was had anything actually gone wrong. Funny, but the more I dive now, the more utterly frustrated I am at how much there is to learn - and how far back I am on the learning curve. Now, I firmly believe that my OW and AOW were nothing but a learner's permit and probationary license respectively - that's it. If the courses were marketed like that, perhaps newcomers to the sport would respect the water a lot more, and be inspired to keep learning and garner more experience. The more I hear about organizations like BSAC, which seem geared to ensuring members dive regularly, and with more experienced divers acting as mentors - the more impressed I am. Seems like a good way to go.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Every yr, 1 store in Edmonton has around 6 sessions. Somewhere around 10-12 divers and a couple of instructors.

The entire confined water and classroom work is done over a Saturday and Sunday. The checkout dives are not included in the 2 days.


See Section: What about Weekend Programs in one, two or three days?

General Information

So what your really saying is that the classes you have been calling 2-day classes are not really 2-day classes. Since PADI does not allow more than 3 training dives in a day, it would take a minimum of 4 days with the instructor to be a certified diver with this shop, correct?

If it's really a 2-weekend class, why do you continue to call it a 2-day class? There are plenty of other agencies whose instructors certify Open Water divers in 2-weekends, but you only badmouth the PADI 4-day class, by incorrectly calling it a 2-day class.

Perhaps this particular local dive shop turns out bad divers in 4 days, but why disparage all PADI shops/instructors worldwide?

 

[boulderjohn]

I am confused about this kind of statement, mostly made by a specific handful of SB'ers. Where, when and how many "one weekend PADI classes" have you seen?

...

IMHO, 2-day PADI classes that produce OW certification only exist in the imaginations of the PADI bashers. The only way I will believe differently is if links are published to actual 2-day OW classes being offered.

I made the same challenge a couple of weeks ago, and I was given a link to advertised "weekend" courses. I followed the link and found that the actual instructional time was 3 pretty much full days (Friday was considered part of the weekend), and that was only after student had completed the self study materials at home. It was actually a 4 full day course if you included it all.

I don't think a true 2 day course is possible without completely shattering standards. I myself was certified in a 3 day course at a resort, and it was not until years later that I realized how many standards were totally ignored in order to make ti happen.

I find it interesting that in general when people talk about course length, they act is if the at-home self study portion of the course did not exist or was instantaneous. This is especially true when students take the eLearning option, which critics assume means they plug their brains into a computer via a USB port and download the information instantly.

 

[boulderjohn]

The entire confined water and classroom work is done over a Saturday and Sunday. The checkout dives are not included in the 2 days.

So when is the at-home academics done? Since that generally takes about 8-10 hours, and since OW dives take 2 days, you area really talking about is a 5 day course. So you were off by 150%

tee hee...It sucks to be wrong.

I'm sure it does. Why not give us a report?

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

See Section: What about Weekend Programs in one, two or three days?

General Information

Here's their schedule. 8 weekend sessions. (my bad..I said 6)

Upcoming Scuba Lessons


tee hee...It sucks to be wrong.

Just to be clear on who exactly you are talking about when you type "it sucks to be wrong" let's look closely at the first page you linked;

What about Weekend Programs in one, two or three days?
Weekend programs, consisting of about 25 hours of training are for the self motivated student with a weekend available. While the six week programs provide a more relaxed pace, the weekend program is excellent for people leaving on a winter holiday who would like to receive class and pool instruction before they go.

This is a referral, with the 4 Open Water dives to be done on vacation or another weekend. Their other training is 27 hours of classroom/pool, not including OW checkout dives.

I am still waiting for a link to a 2-day class from any instructor/lds that results in OW certification.