Looking to Start a dive club on Campus

[soonerwink]

I would recommend not to associate with any one dive shop or agency. Just support all dive shops and agencies and do not allow any bad mouthing or negative posts about any of the shops or instructors. It is very easy to start a facebook page for your club, and it's free. If possible have a monthly meeting at a local restaurant or coffee shop. You can also invite your local dive shops to post any trips or upcoming events to share with your group. Also have your members to be sure and post their videos and pictures to your page. You may start out with a small group, but by word of mouth and members sharing to their friends it will grow. I started a group with only 6 members 14 years ago ( Oklahoma Aquanauts ) and now have over 1700 members here in Oklahoma, a land locked state.

 

[OTF]

The above is true for personal dive stuff - though you could argue the merit of fully supporting one dive shop vs. spreading the love to several.

HOWEVER, things are different in the land of institutions. For a school club it's important to have an established relationship with a single instructor/shop. The school will require setting up some kind of insurance structure, payment approval, probably contracts for group trainings and bulk gear servicing, etc. And the school administration needs to feel like there's a legit safe business handling the dive club's safety. It's far easier to get set up with one familiar vendor than multiple. Honestly just one takes a ton of work if there are any insurance hangups. Sort of like how institutions like to commit to one reliable parts vendor (eg. McMaster) for simplicity and reliability rather than vetting 15 different cheaper or more local options.

 

[NCK]

I have never done anything like this but I would think the easiest thing to do would be start a FB group. If you get decent interest you could then use those contacts to make it more of a formal club.