[QUOTE="JohnnyC, post: 7616562, member: 429324']You can go from being a non-diver to AOW in 10 dives through PADI
with dives like Fish ID and Underwater Naturalist, it's not like many of those dives mean much of anything.
Nine, not 10, but your point is clear.
Deep and Navigation DO mean something, and they are both required.
PPB is the most common first-dive for AOW, and can be taught (within standards) to be VERY meaningful and helpful.
Fish ID and U/W Nat'l can be VERY good classes, but my guess is you have not had them and could not teach them.
I think your point is that an AOW card might not mean much.....but it usually means more than you give it credit for, and it could mean a lot.[/QUOTE]
In the scope of developing skills as a diver, the courses I mentioned don't develop useful skills related to the specific action of diving. Maybe I should have been more clear in specifying that courses like that do not make one an advanced diver skill wise. My ability to teach those courses has nothing to do with the fact that there are people teaching those courses who may do no better a job of instruction, despite being "qualified" to teach.
As for PPB, I agree, it can be great, however it is an elective course, which doesn't necessarily mean it gets taught at all in the course of some divers continuing education. In light of that fact, aside from skill-developing dives like navigation and deep, you could easily obtain an advanced certification with those dives being the only actual dives where skill development takes place.
The fact is that advanced can certainly be beneficial, however, within the frame of 9 dives, one would be hard-pressed to consider someone an advanced diver, regardless of their path of instruction.