i require my students, at whatever level (especially instructors), to provide the gas calculations for the dive we're going to do..
On that note, I'd suggest that one big problem facing many divers is that continuation training given beyond entry-level is very weak in syllabus and substance.
For many agencies, the curriculum
fails to tangibly raise diver expertise, knowledge, competency and ability as further qualifications are undertaken to increase the range of diving.
A particular culprit is 'Deep Diver' training. For the most part, this training is insubstantial, vapid and illusory.
More comprehensive curriculum and standards for recreational diver training in deep no-stop diving would go a long way to resolving many of the issues debated here on Scubaboard.
Effective gas planning and management, use of redundancy, higher standard fundamental skills, refined ascent protocols and theory knowledge of basic decompression science
should be synonymous with deeper no-stop diving.
Doing so would reduce the issue of 'experienced' divers who still
don't know what they don't know. It'd increase the diver's 'toolbox' for maintaining safety when dive parameters are extended... and it'd provide a definitive 'step' between basic recreational diving and technical diving.
Of course there are (
a tiny minority) of instructors who achieve good Deep Diver training by supplementing the standard syllabus with additional components.... but this is the rare exception, not the norm.
As some have noted... I'm a firm believer in the value of training.
However, I also believe
strongly that training must have that tangible
value.
Training must coherently and radically improve diver competency; delivering real capacity development in-line with the level of diving undertaken.
I do feel that many divers have become cynical about the necessity for training.
Not because they don't inherently value or appreciate training... but because they're disillusioned with having undertaken training that didn't provide tangible, real-world, benefits to their diving capability.
I can sympathise with that cynicism.
It's hard to appreciate the value of training if you've never experienced effective, high-quality training.
That said, I also believe that a significant share of the blame lies with divers who don't
source good quality training.
Especially when those divers have a mindset to shop around only for the cheapest, quickest or most convenient training providers; sometimes in the delusion that they're simply buying a 'license'... and not paying for expert tuition.
If you resign yourself to the
expectation that training has little value, then you're likely to create a self-fulfilling prophesy.... and you'll experience only what you expect to find.
If you appreciate and understand the value of good training, then you'll commit time and money to sourcing it.
Training only has the value that the
individual puts on it. If you don't value training, then you'll probably reap what you sew... and waste money on valueless c-cards instead of developing tangible competencies.