My Venture into GUE - Another view

[Cave Diver]

I would like to address class size, and logistics. Recently there seems to be some discussion with 6 person classes . I have been teaching 6 person fundamentals class' for years. With a max of six students, I would limit in water to max of 3 divers at one time, allowing attention to be focused solely on the team that was diving, while the other team practiced dry runs, ate , worked on equipment mods, and took needed breaks ect. This is not a waste of time but an effective use of it, I always increase the amount of days for the class to more than cover any gap potentially created by additional students. When traveling this becomes much more important and has proven to be very effective at improving the overall pass rate, This also allows for the best opportunity to build teams of similar skills and ability. In a class of three what do you do if one person or two is significantly holding back the others? once you get into the 4-6 range there are normally sets of equal or more closely related divers. then you can build teams to work on the areas of weakness,
Standards state 3 days for three people and 4 days for four or more people This was a 5 day class exceeding all standards and allowing ample time for each student to have multiple opportunities to achieve their goals. More water time is NOT always going to make a difference in the outcome as sometimes people will hit a wall within the time allotted. For many 5 days is enough, but for some 20 would not be enough. Time takes time!!!! Welcome to the journey.

<snip>

I agree that the first day was a bit light on water time, 40-45 minutes per team 2 teams of 3, We later adjusted the teams down to 3 teams of 2 members each to account for the difference in team performance and ability. the days that followed had similar times, but two dives per day(I counted a total of 9 dives for one team, and 8 for the others). actual minutes may vary, but I can only attest to me personally being in the water with each team way longer than has been stated here. I believe someone posted a nice chart on an earlier page that showed 6 dives in one day totaling 99 minutes. <G> (bottom timers often time out when in shallow water or when buoyancy control take you above their activation/shut off depth)

After going back and re-reading your post more thoroughly, I'd like to say that I especially appreciate your clarification on the above issues. This seems to have been a big point for a few people and your response helps give a much clearer picture of how and why things were done this way.

 

[Selchie in LB]

Thank you Bob Sherwood! I was fortunate enough to meet you and dive with you (if only in a pool) in LA. I was amazed at your enthusiasm and your openness. You have shown us this again here with your post.

 

[mike_s]

hear that? sounds like crickets......





**chirp** **chirp***

 

[ScubaSteve]

Thank you very much for the well written and thought out post Bob.

 

[Mayor]

Now that's the part we were missing.....

Thanks for taking the time Bob!

 

[kanonfodr]

Thanks for the input, Bob!

oh, and is this really </thread> ?? If it is...wow...

Peace,
Greg

 

[Hepcat62]

Thanks for providing the other side of the story, Bob.

oh, and is this really </thread> ?? If it is...wow...

I think that unless all parties involved decide they want to have a very public postmortem on the class, we've heard just about all there is to hear. Certainly, some people came away unsatisfied. Certainly there were some extenuating circumstances - conditions, facility issues, etc. - that did not help (although the extent to which they actually hurt seems debatable). It also seems to be the case that the things many of us liked about our fundies classes were there in this class, but perhaps have not yet been (and maybe will never be) digested fully - just to be clear, there's no blame implied (on anyone) in that statement. As TS&M has pointed out (sorry if I misinterpreted you), and I fully agree, sometimes the lessons you take from classes like these can take a while to really sink in...

The most important take-aways from this thread - to me - are the reiteration of (and new sticky about) the common pitfalls to avoid when preparing to take Fundies, and the understanding that local communities of trained divers and mentors have a huge potential impact on how things go before, during, and (perhaps especially) after class. I certainly have come away with an increased appreciation for the resources I have available to me locally.

 

[lamont]

Having a discussion with Jax (OP) about this, and I *think* the right thing to do now is to lock the thread...

I'd rather not see Bob's response get buried in the middle of a thread with a bunch of semi-random riffing and dead-horse-beating trailing off for additional pages, and after >450 replies I think anything that could have been said has been said.

If there's really something pressing missed in this discussion, despite the length of it, another thread could always get opened up...

So, not trying to stifle discussion here, but I think the utility of this particular thread has his its peak.