PADI Holds The New World's Record for Fastest OW Class

[Goose75]

Storm,

I like your analogies to driver training and hunter safety but the difference is that those are legal requirements. Certification agencies are businesses. They cannot enforce anything other than the right to refuse a card until their criteria is met. After that, the agency looses all control. The only power the agencies truly have is the ability to deny you a fill without a card due to a mutually beneficial relationship with dive shops. Without the mass of new divers buying equipment that arrangement will change. Take one of the largest agencies, change the OW standards to the point some have discussed here and the market will quickly drive them into a small agency that offers a more expensive, rigorous program. That market isn’t large. Agencies are businesses that are not in it to loose or make less money. Like it or not, it is reality. The best ways to effect change you wish for is to either find profitable way to change standards or to create a new agency targeting the divers who want this.

That said, I think you have good points with the “advanced” programs. Since these are geared towards divers who are asking for more, the market is better for adding requirements. To make it happen, a business case would have to be made to restructure the cert tree and add in new standards.

 

[Storm]

Storm,
I like your analogies to driver training and hunter safety but the difference is that those are legal requirements.

They weren’t always legal requirements, they started off as grass roots involvement, then as the number of user grew (in the case of the driver the number of cars grew to the point that they become the prime method of ground travel) legislation was introduced to control the use and promote the safety of the populace.

Hunter safety training, in Ontario anyway, grew out of the grass roots clubs and was later adopted into a legal pre-requisite.

As to the rest of your post

Certification agencies are businesses. They cannot enforce anything other than the right to refuse a card until their criteria is met. After that, the agency looses all control. The only power the agencies truly have is the ability to deny you a fill without a card due to a mutually beneficial relationship with dive shops. Without the mass of new divers buying equipment that arrangement will change. Take one of the largest agencies, change the OW standards to the point some have discussed here and the market will quickly drive them into a small agency that offers a more expensive, rigorous program. That market isn’t large. Agencies are businesses that are not in it to loose or make less money. Like it or not, it is reality. The best ways to effect change you wish for is to either find profitable way to change standards or to create a new agency targeting the divers who want this.

That said, I think you have good points with the “advanced” programs. Since these are geared towards divers who are asking for more, the market is better for adding requirements. To make it happen, a business case would have to be made to restructure the cert tree and add in new standards.

I too understand that the agencies are profit based, and I have come to understand, after plunking down my cash and seeing what their training offerins are, that they appeared to me more concerned with maintaining their profit lines than improving their training courses.

I'll argue that the basics of what I was suggesting for changes to the current standards ar not geared toward divers who are asking for more, but rather the average new diver who needs these basic skills to be effect, personally safe, and safe for other divers and the diving environment.

The whole training side of the industry is based on taking a course then mentoring with the local dive community. (Hoping that some more experienced diver at the site that day will help the rookie out, or the rookie is heading out with more experienced diver from the get go). At least this is the advice I have been given at least a hundred times.

Many divers suggested that I go the local dive community (and I include my LDS in that community) to get help with buoyancy, trim, fin kicks, via attending regular dive sessions at local sites. My DI's even suggested this during their classes.

It's good advice, don't misunderstand me, but it's also the root of the training issues that I have. These basics should be addressed in the OW class, not off laid, for pure profit and convenience, on the local dive community.

Basic 60 foot and under divers still need to be able to trim themselves out, maintain proper physical attitude in the water column and keep themselves off the bottom, and from becoming mudpuppies, and have effect finning skills to keep them off of fragile underwater environments, whether they be living coral reefs or 200 year old sweet water wrecks.

IMO, this isn't advance stuff. Advance stuff is, nitrox, drift diving, night diving, deep diving, added equipment and task loading (photography, scooters), wreck penetration.
A diver needs to have mastery over the basics before they can dive effectively and safely (again for themselves, other divers, and the environment) and perform the above mentioned activities.

A simple way to ensure that these skills are taught and learned properly would be to simply require that the students, during their checkout dives, perform their skills while in a neutral, and horizontal diving attitude, instead of kneeling, over weighted, in the mud.

 

[Goose75]

...I'll argue that the basics of what I was suggesting for changes to the current standards ar not geared toward divers who are asking for more, but rather the average new diver who needs these basic skills to be effect, personally safe, and safe for other divers and the diving environment...

Perhaps the best approach for you to advocate change is too conduct some research on diver safety & training and then write a report. At the end you can hypothesize the effect specific changes to the standards may have improving safety. This report can then be sent to the agencies and posted for divers to get interest. You can even go as far as collecting signatures of divers to show support for the idea. I’m sure DAN would be happy to support you with data they have collected. Plus scubaboard is an easy place to poll divers.

I say this not to be critical or difficult but to offer an actual suggestion. You sound determined to advocate change and this is probably the best route besides creating your own agency. Plus many a researcher has revised their original hypothesis after study. You may find things worse or better than you believe. We throw around opinions, stray statistics and experiences all day on SB but few really tackle the issues in a scientific argument. Businesses and government tend to give more credence to complaints that are well written rather than calls. This is because it shows thought and determination. You may find they listen. Or, they may not but you will have comfort in that you took action.

 

[Storm]

Perhaps the best approach for you to advocate change is too conduct some research on diver safety & training and then write a report. At the end you can hypothesize the effect specific changes to the standards may have improving safety. This report can then be sent to the agencies and posted for divers to get interest. You can even go as far as collecting signatures of divers to show support for the idea. I’m sure DAN would be happy to support you with data they have collected. Plus scubaboard is an easy place to poll divers.

Actually the documentation is already underway. Surveys are being drafted, and the research has already begun. (Perhaps you did not get the chance to read the whole thread --its quite long with allot of bantering so many have not read the whole thing)
I have already interviewed a hundred or so “not yet but plan to”, OW, and AOW divers with less than 20 dives logged. I believe this is the group that represents the target audience of the first few training courses.

I hesitate to use SB polls as they represent a fairly specific group of divers, and the results of such polls could be questioned. This is not to imply that the folks here are damaged goods, just that by the very fact that they spend time on the board means their interest level is above average (in some cases they are heavily entrenched with the agencies and status quo and adverse to change as a result of their affiliations), hence they may not all fall into the “average new diver” category.

The group that had already taken some sort of training was asked to rate their level of satisfaction with their courses, and what they learned, and to identify potential holes in the standards.

The “not yet but plan to” group was asked to identify the agency they were planning on using and why"

I say this not to be critical or difficult but to offer an actual suggestion. You sound determined to advocate change and this is probably the best route besides creating your own agency. Plus many a researcher has revised their original hypothesis after study. You may find things worse or better than you believe. We throw around opinions, stray statistics and experiences all day on SB but few really tackle the issues in a scientific argument. Businesses and government tend to give more credence to complaints that are well written rather than calls. This is because it shows thought and determination. You may find they listen. Or, they may not but you will have comfort in that you took action.

I do not deem my diving knowledge to be anywhere near enough to even contemplate the agency thing. Beside I truly believe that another agency is not what is needed. The areas that I have highlighted for change are based on the anecdotal information provided to me by those interviewees and do not represent my own personal experiences. I must admit it was an incident that I had that got me asking the questions, but for the most part the opinions that I am expressing here are a consolidation of the various opinions expressed to me with my own mixed in for good measure.
I would like to see change, but would prefer to see it stem from the grass roots. ( A demand more and get more campaign) I believe in this case, leveraging consumer buying power, and threatening profit lines would be a better agents for change, than another report that the standards committee (which is staffed, or should I say dominated, by the existing agencies) could easily ignore. I DO NOT WANT government or legal intervention as I have seen the results, in other sports, of these type of groups getting involved, and the result were consistently the same…excess legislation and costly bureaucracy.

Many DIs and DMs I have spoken to have expressed agreement that perhaps it’s time to look at changing the way intro training is conducted. Some are on-board completely; others want to look deeper into the details for themselves, some say I’m an out to lunch rookie without enough experience, and to green to be able to make an enlightened opinion. I won’t be breaking open the champagne any time soon, but if some are questioning, others contemplating, than perhaps the tiniest of snowballs has been started down the hill.

Personally, I have learned more in the last two months studying this issue, and taking in everyone opinions, than I would have in a month of Sundays. From that knowledge I have been able to piece together a training plan for my wife and I that will allow us to reach our objectives with very limited influence from the RTSC standards or any one agency; To that end, my goals have been reached.

Thanks to all for your input.


Cheers and here’s to safe and happy diving for everyone.

 

[boulderjohn]

For those of you who seem to believe that change is impossible within an agency, I have made two comments to PADI in the past six months or so that will probably result in changes in the future. They were very receptive to my comments and in one case called me to talk through the issues and work together to come to a good plan. They did tell me that changes take a while, so it will be a while before they make their way into general use, although I think I saw some of it emerge this winter.

If you feel you have a good case for a change, make it.

 

[Goose75]

Actually the documentation is already underway. Surveys are being drafted, and the research has already begun. (Perhaps you did not get the chane to read the whole thread --its quite long with alot of bantering so many have not read the whole thing)

I read 90% of it and scanned about 10%. I missed that part. That's good. It'll change your points from speculation to a significant proposal.

 

[Storm]

For those of you who seem to believe that change is impossible within an agency, I have made two comments to PADI in the past six months or so that will probably result in changes in the future. They were very receptive to my comments and in one case called me to talk through the issues and work together to come to a good plan. They did tell me that changes take a while, so it will be a while before they make their way into general use, although I think I saw some of it emerge this winter.

If you feel you have a good case for a change, make it.

Can you PM with the details of the subject, and to whom you were speaking to.

 

[boulderjohn]

Sure.

 

[lowwall]

Storm -

Pardon me if this was addressed already, but it looks to me like you are mising something important.

The raison d'etre for basic open water courses is safety. The agencies simply want to turn out divers who are not a danger to themselves or others. They do this by teaching the minimal skill set required to keep divers safe under given limited conditions and then they constantly repeat both the skills (e.g., do not hold your breath) and the condition limitations (e.g., open water, NDL depths) until the prospective diver is likely to remember it even if they don't see water more than once a year.

Assuming the skills and limitations are reasonable, this approach both provides safety for those who stay within the constraints and provides the agencies and those who train according to their standards with a decent liability shield.

What it doesn't do is make for a a streamlined, well-trimmed diver with superior buoyancy skills, and an arsenal of finning techniques. OK, we all agree with that. But I (along with every existing agency?) do not believe that the entry level course is the place for teaching this. There are purely economic arguments for this but there is also at least one large safety argument for it: most divers are going to dive infrequently, so if you spend most of your time teaching nice-to-know skills it is more likely they will forget or not focus on the must-know stuff in an emergency.

Now, if you wanted to work on a standard skill set for an advanced open water divers rating, I would certainly agree that everything you mention should be included along with navigation and perhaps some stressed diver assistance. Then all you'd need to do is get dive operators to require advanced certification for advanced activities.

Alex

 

[Mlody11]

Storm, I am really glad you decided to look into the matter much more closely then simply throwing out ideas. Too many times people scream and yell about things they dislike and simply turn around and say someone else can force the change. I did not read all the post since 30 pages of posts is quite alot. I hope your research will shed some light on the issues and perhaps address them in a way that enchances the safety of divers everywhere. I think everyone has great comments and ideas .