To those considering an OW class...

[lowwall]

Eric,

I can't believe I'm alone in wanting to get skills and knowledge through a formal course. When I finished OW, I was very comfortable in the water and had no problem following a DM around at a resort, but felt completely incapable of going diving on my own. I tried AOW to fill in the gaps, but got very little from it other than a few dives, my first octopus sighting and a growing suspicion of PADI's motivations.

My wife, OTOH, was not sure of her skills after completing OW. She almost gave up diving completely after an uncontrolled ascent on her 10th post-cert dive. We had already paid for our next trip, so she decided to give it one more chance. Thankfully the DMs/instructors at that resort (Pirate's Point in Little Cayman) were great and worked with her until she was confident and competent in the basic skills. But I wonder how many other divers quit after a single bad experience early in their diving career.

The problem with just doing additional dives without knowledge beyond that found in an OW or even AOW course taught to minimum standards is that you will learn some things, but it's just as likely you are ingraining bad habits. Even worse, it can lead to a false sense of security, so you place yourself in situations where you won't be able to cope if things go wrong.

Depending on random acquaintances to mentor you is no better. A good chunk of the divers you will run into won't have any more of a clue than you. And you don't have any way to reliably separate the good advice from the bad.

So where are people like me to turn? I didn't trust the local shop where I took my OW course and I was unwilling to sit through a half dozen of PADI's sales seminars (aka courses) to get what I want. Eventually I found my way to Scubaboard where the information flows freely enough that I have some confidence I can separate the wheat from the chaff, but that doesn't solve the problem of picking up in-water skills.

It would be so much easier if I could just take a course or two and get everything the open water rec diver really needs to know. Then I could be confident that further dives would result in a polishing of my skills rather than making the same mistakes with greater proficiency.

BTW, DIR-F isn't the answer as long as GUE insists on a particular gear configuration and planning/gas management that is unnecessarily restrictive for recreational diving.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I'll pitch in.

 

[MikeFerrara]

BTW, DIR-F isn't the answer as long as GUE insists on a particular gear configuration and planning/gas management that is unnecessarily restrictive for recreational diving.

In what way do you feel GUE gas management or dive planning is unnecesessarily restrictive? The insist on having enough gas reserved to get both divers to the surface. I don't think that's overly restrictive.

The overall dive planning methodology that they teach is so simple and complete that it's really is a thing of beauty.

 

[MikeFerrara]

BTW, we spent yesterday afternoon at the quarry. LOL, even I have to leave the board once in a while to get in the water or the whole subject is rendered moot. Anyway, vis isn't the greatest this time of year with algea blooms and the beach open but it's diveable and it beats working in the yard.

There were a total of 11 divers signed in for the day. Of those 9 other divers 2 were there to rack up dives toward a pro-level cert they are working on. As I heard it their original plan was to get in around 20 dives but ending up lending out a tank or something and they cut it short to 6 dives.

Sounds like a busy day of diving right? Well, these six dives consisted of gearing up and entering the water once. They would surface every once in a while for a few minutes and drop back down, logging that as another dive. This came to my attention because we were sitting around chatting with the management and I saw those divers surface several times. I asked if they were lost or something (it's only a little lake so how do you get lost?) and that's when he explained what they were doing. He laughed and said that it was good that they were at least getting in the water rather than just faking the log book. I'm not sure that I really see the difference.

Something like this wouldn't be worth discussing except that we see it a lot and now I even see instructors who are working on technical teaching experience requirements doing the same sort of stuff. Once at 40 Fathom Grotto in Florida we saw a couple racking up dives this way and they were just going back and forth between the surface and sitting on a shallow training platform because they wanted to be able to get a bunch of dives out a single tank of air.

New divers should be aware of how some of these DM's and instructors come to be DM's and instructors. I hate to suggest looking at log books because we don't all keep logs and one can write fiction in one as easy as anything else. Still, make sure that the one you pick to teach you diving has actually done some diving.

I don't see anything wrong with counting quarry dives because they represent a unique environment that I think a well rounded diver should have some experience in but...one dive is just one dive. If you do the same exact dive a whole bunch of times, the experience gained can be little more than the experience gained from just doing it once even if you count it as 50.

 

[radio flyer]

I wonder if there would be a market for two lines of OW courses--a Premium Open Water class (8 weeks--which includes skills and material covered in AOW--which should be in OW!!) and a Budget Open Water (as is)?

At least some people would benefit from market drivers...

 

[cork2win]

Since there are nearly 30 pages in this post I don't have time to read them all but would like to give my opinion. I start my first class tonight. I searched and searched and searched all over town for the best class. I'm not in a hurry. In fact, I'm terrified and wanted the longest, best training possible. I couldn't find anything other than an SSI shop that offers 5 classes over 2.5 weeks totalling 20 hours. All the other courses are shorter, other than a private class offered by a NAUI guy that was nearly impossible to reach so I had to mark him off the list.

I believe there ARE people out there that want and would pay for good training, but in my experience it's not even offered at most places, so how can you say that people don't want it or won't pay for it? I'm sure most shops have gone to the shorter classes because it's better for them financially. More people through the classes more quickly, and people coming back to pay for "advanced" classes because they didn't learn enough in the basic class. Great deal all around for the dive shop, or so it seems to me.

I imagine the tide may turn when more people start dying because of lack of training, then the insurance companies will step in because they hate to have a loss. Until then though, there are those of us looking for good training that just can't find it.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I wonder if there would be a market for two lines of OW courses--a Premium Open Water class (8 weeks--which includes skills and material covered in AOW--which should be in OW!!) and a Budget Open Water (as is)?

At least some people would benefit from market drivers...

I can't speak for any other instructor but when I teach an entry level course, I teach to the skill level that I think a diver should be at before being certified to dive independantly. In general, that's a good bit above what some others think is necessary but it certainly doesn't include skills or material that I think belongs in an "advanced" class. It just is what it is and I don't see any way to shorten it that I would be willing to teach.

Some students are able to learn faster than others and in an ideal situation it's nice to be in a position to take that into account. I have found that teaching a more complete class tends to even out those differences in learning speed a bit. The slower learner will be faster for having a better bas on which to build and there will almost always be something that the faster learner can use more practice at.

 

[DrSteve]

Once again I have to harp on to the BSAC system:
A range of dives are required to qualify even though you only need 10 dives to move up each level (with the academics) they can't all be the same dive, 6 dives in a lake on the same day = 1 dive that counts. 12 dives in the same lake over 12 months = 1 dive. OK we can stretch it to 2 dives if we include a night dive.

The other thing BSAC is hot on is signing off on dives and diving all your dives with the same buddy with no one else witnessing those dives...nope that won't cut it either. This is further facilitated by having club events where most of the club goes to a location to dive.

If there is interest I can post when I get home the range of dives that was expected from the novice to sports diver progression.

Here's a wild thought...contact GUE/DIR and see if they are willing to work with you guys to develop an OW course...failing that BSAC will accept cross overs providing you can attend a 2 day course in the UK/Europe and then you need 7 divers to set up a branch.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I doubt I'll be going overseas for anything. In my experience, JJ and other GUE folks are usually more than willing to discuss dive training in general though I certainly couldn't say what their attitude toward some one starting an agency would be.

 

[TheRedHead]

Thankfully the DMs/instructors at that resort (Pirate's Point in Little Cayman) were great and worked with her until she was confident and competent in the basic skills. But I wonder how many other divers quit after a single bad experience early in their diving career.

I've seen a lot of posts villifying Caribbean DMs for leading unqualified divers on "trust me" dives, but in my experience many of them provide remedial instruction to divers like your wife who were not comfortable with their diving skills learned at home.

I'm sure many divers quit after a bad local experience. Log-splitter's post on his AOW experience typifies the kind of class that leads to never diving again.