Zero to hero - top schools?

[OceanEd]

I am a Course Director for PADI and a past NAUI Course Director among others. I have seen people come out of these courses that are very good as well as people that are not so good. It really depends on the individual that is being trained and the school staff that is doing the instruction. Would I hire one of these people in our shop? Absolutely, if I felt they were now willing to continue to learn and gain more experience.

The one thing you will not get from these programs is years of diving experience. I know that. But I see more and more people who become Divemasters with the minimum time and dive qualifications and they pass the PADI IE and some are very good. I actrually look for new instructors in some cases because I want to be able to train them in our system and I am confident we can continue to work with them to help them gain experience.

The courses are concentrated, yes, but I think this is a great way to learn. When you are immersed (no pun intended) every day you can almost supercharge your learning. Once again, the one thing you cannot gain is the years of experience, but that comes with time.

The ideal situation would the the program at Berry College which has the only 4 year college program to become a dive instructor and dive industry professional. Unfortunately, that is not an option for most people.

 

[Thalassamania]

... Would I hire one of these people in our shop? Absolutely, if I felt they were now willing to continue to learn and gain more experience.

The one thing you will not get from these programs is years of diving experience. I know that. But I see more and more people who become Divemasters with the minimum time and dive qualifications and they pass the PADI IE and some are very good. I actrually look for new instructors in some cases because I want to be able to train them in our system and I am confident we can continue to work with them to help them gain experience.

Not being a one trial learner I repeatedly made the mistake of taking in already certified instructors and trying to teach them, "our system." With one notable exception (who damn near made up for the trouble of all the failures) this was a complete waste of time an energy. It was not really a combination of their lack of skill and knowledge but rather a reticence to accept the fact that they were less capable (within our milieu) than were our newly finished students. Finally we took the approach that if you did not come up through the program and you wanted to teach with us, you needed to start at the bottom, do the entry-level class and as a result of your performance there be selected for the staff development course, just like anyone else. In less than 50% of the cases were previous "pros" selected for future staff.

The courses are concentrated, yes, but I think this is a great way to learn. When you are immersed (no pun intended) every day you can almost supercharge your learning. Once again, the one thing you cannot gain is the years of experience, but that comes with time.

It's more that just the years of experience, we both know that we can jam several years of skills and knowledge into a few well designed weeks, but what's lacking is maturity and judgment that should go with the skills and knowledge. Additionally (at least in my experience) the people who design and run the zero-to-would-be-hero programs tend toward the fast-buck artist side of the industry as opposed to the serious educator side (this is to be expected). So they are exactly the wrong people to be designing and running such programs. The people who could do the best just are those who are least interested.

The ideal situation would the the program at Berry College which has the only 4 year college program to become a dive instructor and dive industry professional. Unfortunately, that is not an option for most people.

That is a good way to go if you intend to make a life of it.

Merry Christmas,

Thal

 

[CDNScubaMoose]

I did my IDC at one of the schools that offer the zero to hero approach. Several members of my IDC class were enrolled in that approach. A couple others had taken an approach of jumping from one course to the next - not signed up for the zero to hero but definitely taking an accelerated approach to becoming an instructor.

Personally I found the immersion of the IDC to be a very useful approach for learning the "teaching method" that PADI wanted. Another benefit was the fact that the CD's that conducted that IDC had a lot of experience in training instructors. They were able to pass on their knowledge of what made a good instructor and offer valuable insight. I believe the reason they were able to gain this knowledge to a certain extent because they did see and work with so many instructor candidates.

That said, I look back on my experience and feel that I was robbed to a certain extent as well. Those clasemates of mine that were either ZTH or on their own accelerated path brought absolutely nothing to the table for me to learn from with the noted exception of why real world experiences are critical (since they were completely lacking in them). If I had been in an IDC with other divers that had been working DM's (as I was part time) that had at least a year or two of experience then I could have gained from their experiences as well. In the end, only half the ZTH candidates sat for the IE and those that did, passed the IE. But within 12 months they had all quit teaching.

So to the OP - I wouldn't write off schools that do offer the ZTH approach as they may have some of the most experienced course directors in the industry but ask yourself (as many have already suggested and mentioned) - how do you plan on gaining the experience outside of the courses that will make you a valuable commodity to future employers and students.

 

[OceanEd]

Thal:

Good points. I also would rather train up my own instructors and develop them through my own system. To me this is more cost effective over the long run as long as I am willing to spend the time with them to "mentor" them constantly to help them develop. One of my pet peeves is that when many instructors leave their IDC they stop their instructor development for the most part. Few of them really continue to learn and grow on their own.

I agree that if you are dealing with a "fast buck" course the students are not going to get a good deal. I do know several instructors who are training Instructors full time at their Career Development Centers and they are very good and very thorough at what they do. They have to be because all the statistics say that by far their best form of advertising is word of mouth. Also, if they do not turn out a quality product the word gets out pretty quickly and no one will hire their students.

There are some points where some of the ZTH courses do outshine the regular IDC's. That is in the area of business. The standard IDC teaches the candidates nothing about sales, working in a shop, working on a dive boat, etc. Many of the CDC's (Career Development Centers) do add modules which help with this. Dive employeers really are crying for this type of training also in their new employees.

It's all a balance.

 

[Thalassamania]

... I agree that if you are dealing with a "fast buck" course the students are not going to get a good deal. I do know several instructors who are training Instructors full time at their Career Development Centers and they are very good and very thorough at what they do. They have to be because all the statistics say that by far their best form of advertising is word of mouth. Also, if they do not turn out a quality product the word gets out pretty quickly and no one will hire their students.

If what you consider to be very good and very through is the ability to get a candidate to toe the PADI line, without either imagination or creativity for the year or so that they will survive in the business before they burn out and are replaced by a similar starry-eyed newcomer, I'd have to agree. I do not see that as resposible or honest behavior, nor do I see that as being very good at doing anything but separating a person from his cash by using his dreams as a lever.

There are some points where some of the ZTH courses do outshine the regular IDC's. That is in the area of business. The standard IDC teaches the candidates nothing about sales, working in a shop, working on a dive boat, etc. Many of the CDC's (Career Development Centers) do add modules which help with this. Dive employeers really are crying for this type of training also in their new employees.

Those have nothing what-so-ever to do with teaching diving. I taught diving for more than forty years and I am rather proud of the fact that I have never sold a student piece of diving gear, yet I suspect that on average each of my students has bought more gear than those of any other instructor that you have ever met (we require a full set of owned gear for class). What dive employers, in my observation want, is someone who will do what they want, the way that they want it, when they want it and will accept pay at about the level of a fast food worker, without any benefits, and be thankful for that.

It's all a balance.

Not much of one from what I have seen.

 

[OceanEd]

Thal:

You are missing the point. By training the new instructors to use the complete PADI system to teach divers you are actually freeing him up to become more creative and to be able to add local knowledge into the course because the PADI materials he is using take care of the basics in a uniform way. This allows the instructors to personalize a class and make it their own if they have the ability. I like that.

I disagree about the instructor being involved in helping the students buy equipment. He is the obvious choice to be the studen's equipment counselor because he knows the student and he should know the various pieces of diving equipment. Part of his job should be to help the student make his choices. I am surprised you don't see that. Progressive shop owners should understand how valuable this part of an instructors job really can be.

I agree with you about the pay being too low for insructors. One way to counter this is to have an instructor who is well rounded and who also works in the shop and perhaps on the shop's dive boats. This enables him to greatly increase his/her pay and still be a great instructor. Our goal at ScubaWorks is to have all our instructors trained by the company reps in all the features of their equipment. The instructors get a comission on equipment sales to students. We also are actively training our instructors so every one who can qualify will be a US Coast Guard capatin so they will be able to work on our dive boats. They also get paid for this. It is no longer really possible to be "only and instructor". We need people who are cross trained to do a multiple of things in order to make it all work.

By having this "balance" we at ScubaWorks are finding it is working very well. We took over this store a year ago in Jupiter where we already have a very large and well established dive store as competition. We have grown by well over 100% in this last year by using these principles and our instructors and employees seem very happy with it. We are also now looking to double our number of instructors for the coming year.

It is a pleasure debating with you both here and on some of the other forums. Hopefully we can meet in person sometime.

 

[Thalassamania]

Thal:

You are missing the point. By training the new instructors to use the complete PADI system to teach divers you are actually freeing him up to become more creative and to be able to add local knowledge into the course because the PADI materials he is using take care of the basics in a uniform way. This allows the instructors to personalize a class and make it their own if they have the ability. I like that.

You make several assumptions, beginning with the adequacy of the training regimen, that I feel are false, those assumptions falsify the entire concept.

I disagree about the instructor being involved in helping the students buy equipment. He is the obvious choice to be the student's equipment counselor because he knows the student and he should know the various pieces of diving equipment. Part of his job should be to help the student make his choices. I am surprised you don't see that. Progressive shop owners should understand how valuable this part of an instructors job really can be.

Again, you make assumptions that just don't stand up. I don't buy my ski equipment from my ski instructor, I may ask his or her advice, but he or she has no pecuniary interest in my choice(s). I do not care for that sort of conflict of interest. Of course "progressive" dive shops love it ... that way they can sell the gear that management wants to move and can kill the gear that they don't have available that week. You and I both know how that works, the spiffs and the specials, the yearly buying commitment, the end collumn pricing, all that have nothing to do with the students' actual needs, so why must we pretend that this is of value to the student. Most shop based instructors don't know squat about the actual choices of gear, since most are still working on their first set, especially the zero-to-would-be-hero types. Since the average instructor has a half-life of abut two years in the industry, they don't even wear out that first set of gear before they go on to their next "profession."

I agree with you about the pay being too low for insructors. One way to counter this is to have an instructor who is well rounded and who also works in the shop and perhaps on the shop's dive boats. This enables him to greatly increase his/her pay and still be a great instructor. Our goal at ScubaWorks is to have all our instructors trained by the company reps in all the features of their equipment. The instructors get a comission on equipment sales to students. We also are actively training our instructors so every one who can qualify will be a US Coast Guard capatin so they will be able to work on our dive boats. They also get paid for this. It is no longer really possible to be "only and instructor". We need people who are cross trained to do a multiple of things in order to make it all work.

That kind of cross training is great and of real value to both the individual and the shop, but the question is why are scuba instructors, in and of themselves, worth so little? Why does a tennis pro or a golf pro make an actual living wage while a scuba instructor does not?

By having this "balance" we at ScubaWorks are finding it is working very well. We took over this store a year ago in Jupiter where we already have a very large and well established dive store as competition. We have grown by well over 100% in this last year by using these principles and our instructors and employees seem very happy with it. We are also now looking to double our number of instructors for the coming year.

I wish you well but you seem to be following the same old model, which while it may make you money, I (for one) could not participate in.

It is a pleasure debating with you both here and on some of the other forums. Hopefully we can meet in person sometime.

I'm sure we have lots of friend in common, anytime you're headed to Hawai'i there's usually room ... but it is first come - first serve.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

but the question is why are scuba instructors, in and of themselves, worth so little? Why does a tennis pro or a golf pro make an actual living wage while a scuba instructor does not?

I do not have near the credentials of either you two, but these 2 seem to be no-brainers.

Recreational SCUBA is so easy some half fit, half wit 10 year olds can easily do it.
Recreational SCUBA is so easy some 60 year olds with BMI's over 35 can easily do it.

Tennis and golf are competitive sports with age division events and teams starting younger than age 10, Jr. High teams, High School teams, College teams, Olympics (only tennis thankfully) and various Pro leagues worldwide where the best in each sport now make over a Billion dollars in their careers.

Just the merchandise sold with Roger and Tiger's names on it is probably more revenue than all the recreational dive gear ever sold! Similar more than all recreational dive gear ever sold revenue is spent JUST on the ads shown during the respective Grand Slam events of each sport, every year!

Try comparing apples to apples, not apples with the eggs from the proverbial golden goose.

How many Mountain biking instructors out there are making a living?

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I wish you well but you seem to be following the same old model, which while it may make you money, I (for one) could not participate in.

Since this is a New Divers and Those Considering Diving thread, where the OP asked a question that was supposed to be flame proof I question whether you should be participating in this thread! It seem to me that you would only have relevent info to ad if the OP had indicated a possible interest in becoming an accredited SH research diver.

Starting with Walter's first post I have been cringing at how rudely the OP has been treated by some of the supposed authorities of SB.

 

[Thalassamania]

I think that the OP received pretty good advice, even though if doesn't agree with what you might have told him.

As for me, I had not intended to join this thread. I refrained from any posts until after the OP had said thanks and I only joined in as a result of a vendor starting to flog his wares, something that I felt needed to be dealt with.

Why are you now fanning the embers of a thread that is basically over and done with? Bored and out for an afternoon troll?