PADI Divemaster without Advanced?

[boulderjohn]

Who are you? The class Sergeant at Arms?

My comment is just my personal opinion and based on personal experience. I became a PADI OWSI up here in the Seattle area in 1995. PADI was the only option for the shop I would be teaching from.

At that same time, my best friend was an instructor for the "other" big shop up here and their only option was NAUI.

Since we were great friends and loved teaching, we basically certified each other as DM's for the respective agencies so that we could help each other out with classes and still be within both agencies standards.

So having extensive experience with both PADI and NAUI Open Water courses at basically the same time, I quickly "became" of the personal opinion that the NAUI course standards were more complete, more thorough, more robust, more challenging and all in all....just a superior course whose standards produced more qualified and more prepared divers then the PADI course. I also very much liked that the NAUI program allowed more discretionary training from the instructors.... By that I mean drills and skills and challenges that are above the minimum standards.

I actually liked the NAUI program so much that I incorporated much of it into my PADI classes for our "fun time" .

Are you talking about the actual standards for the courses, or are you talking about what the individual instructor you knew did in his classes?

My niece was NAUI certified after a couple hours in a pool and 1 OW dive to a maximum depth of 10 feet. Should I conclude that her class met all NAUI standards?

As for being the class Sergeant at Arms, I am simply sick and tired of people repeating old beliefs that have no basis in truth, and I generally step in and try to deal with actual facts. A lot of people do not like that about me. For example, you will regularly see rants about how PADI keeps continually lowering the standards for the courses, requiring students to do less and less. A couple years ago a guy who was saying that posted the course standards from about 30 years ago for comparison. That comparison showed that the only standard from 30 years ago that had been dropped was one regulator buddy breathing, and that was replaced by the alternate air source, which was not in the standards 30 years ago. We then identified (IIRC) 15 standards that PADI had added to the course since then. In summary, PADI has added to the old OW course over the decades, but people will regularly rant that the opposite is true.

 

[Leatherboot69]

Are you talking about the actual standards for the courses, or are you talking about what the individual instructor you knew did in his classes?

My niece was NAUI certified after a couple hours in a pool and 1 OW dive to a maximum depth of 10 feet. Should I conclude that her class met all NAUI standards?

As for being the class Sergeant at Arms, I am simply sick and tired of people repeating old beliefs that have no basis in truth, and I generally step in and try to deal with actual facts. A lot of people do not like that about me. For example, you will regularly see rants about how PADI keeps continually lowering the standards for the courses, requiring students to do less and less. A couple years ago a guy who was saying that posted the course standards from about 30 years ago for comparison. That comparison showed that the only standard from 30 years ago that had been dropped was one regulator buddy breathing, and that was replaced by the alternate air source, which was not in the standards 30 years ago. We then identified (IIRC) 15 standards that PADI had added to the course since then. In summary, PADI has added to the old OW course over the decades, but people will regularly rant that the opposite is true.

Do you have a link to that thread? Would be interesting to read

 

[Bob DBF]

But diving is a very safe activity despite the vast majority of divers only doing a four day course with minimal theory learned by catchphrase. Why make things more difficult, less enjoyable and less popular by changing this?

Yes, diving is safe 'till it isnt, and the casualties are deemed acceptable by the industry, nothing to see here.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Whatever the agency, I just don't want Emily to get hurt.

 

[boulderjohn]

Do you have a link to that thread? Would be interesting to read

I could not find the thread, and I do not have access to course manuals that are 30 years old. If you can find one of any age, we can do a comparison.

I became a professional in 2004. I can assure you that no requirement has been removed since then. It would take me a while, but I can go to the standards and list all that has been added since then, most of them coming in the revisions of 2014. As I said earlier, there were about 15 additions, things like dropping weights on the surface, additional buoyancy requirements, a requirement that the final OW dive be student planned and led with the instructor only following, a mini-dive at the end of the pool sessions, students need to be able to give a reasonably accurate response to the amount of air they have left without checking (because they have been checking regularly), new emphasis on the buddy system, teaching trim, fixing a loose cylinder band, responding to emergency scenarios presented by the instructor while diving with a buddy during the pool session, etc.

Nothing on that list was in the standards when I started instructing or when I was certified in the late 1990s.

 

[Leatherboot69]

Yes, diving is safe 'till it isnt, and the casualties are deemed acceptable by the industry, nothing to see here.

Well, they’re also deemed acceptable by national authorities such as the U.K. Health and Safety Executive. 163 deaths per million divers per year makes it about as risky as jogging and driving. The facts show that diving has a very good safety record, and the training agencies and their programmes are at the core of that, including PADI, despite what SB critics seem to think. The industry has no commercial interest in its customers dying. It has every interest in promoting safety, not reducing it. That argument doesn’t make sense.

 

[Bob DBF]

I could not find the thread, and I do not have access to course manuals that are 30 years old. If you can find one of any age, we can do a comparison.

Padi Diver Manual Revised Edition | eBay

 

[Edward3c]

Well, they’re also deemed acceptable by national authorities such as the U.K. Health and Safety Executive. 1.8 deaths per million dives makes it about as risky as jogging and driving. The facts show that diving has a very good safety record, and the training agencies and their programmes are at the core of that, including PADI, despite what SB critics seem to think. The industry has no commercial interest in its customers dying. It has every interest in promoting safety, not reducing it. That argument doesn’t make sense.

Where did you get the 1.8 per million?

Remember the HSE will only include those under commercial training, like PADI and the oil & gas industries.

Deaths when divers are out doing their own thing doesn't fall under HSE jurisdiction. The BSAC Incident Reports do not give a deaths per x dives as we don't know the total number of dives undertaken in the UK annually.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Deaths when divers are out doing their own thing doesn't fall under HSE jurisdiction. The BSAC Incident Reports do not give a deaths per x dives as we don't know the total number of dives undertaken in the UK annually.

There is no practical way to record number of dives. I don't know how estimates are being made. I'd be curious as to their confidence percentages. Number of tank fills would be a decent approximation for recreational divers. As tech divers are a small number in comparison, my guess is the numbers by all their cylinders would not skew the results too much, especially as deco cylinders. The non-peasant CCR divers (a joke people! ) are too small in number to even bother factoring into the equation.

 

[Seaweed Doc]

Lot of interesting tangents in this thread:

To the OP: There's a mismatch between the PADI web site and the standards. In reality, AOW is required for DM. That said, does it really matter? If you did Adventure Diver plus Nav then went to a DM program, you'd end up having to do a deep dive (with more rigorous expectations than the AOW deep dive). In essence, you've done all of what AOW would do and more most likely.

To those interested in PADI vs. NAUI: I can only comment on my experience. I am a PADI MSDT and have a NAUI AOW card. I worked for decades with a NAUI instructor-colleague who taught at a PADI shop in Seattle that didn't care if some cards they issued said NAUI and others PADI. My purely anecdotally-based speculation is that the two programs have a slight philosophical difference. PADI is all about "we can help the new diver overcome their inabilities/fears/incompetence and learn to dive." It's very similar to a K-12 education model. Fail on your first attempt, we'll give you more tries and remedial education until you're educated. NAUI gave me more of a "hey, that's ok, not everybody needs to be a diver" philosophy. (And that probably overstates my perception. Both help folks work through issues, and both have standards that have to be met or you don't get the card.)

To the friends of Emily, mostly @Trace Malinowski : It would be a shame if Emily were hurt. And I for one would be happy to do what it takes to make sure she stays survives dive training, include mouth-to-mouth as needed.