Dive world is better off with tougher courses?

[Garrobo]

all4: What the hell had driving a car got to do with scuba diving?

 

[Garrobo]

NWGrateful: Hey, Sonny, I've got over 50 dives now and I'm still alive.

 

[Garrobo]

"Diver's License", "Driver's License"----Maybe they could have "Diver's Ed" in High School. That would be cool. Let's see: Studying for the diver's test. Taking the diver's test. Paying your yearly fee. (Of course the fee would increase every year.) Every time you make a screw up, and the diver's police saw it, you would have to go to diver's court and pay a fine to the authoritative body and would recieve points. If you got to many bad diver's points you'd lose your diver's license for a few months to a year. If you didn't pay your yearly fee you'd have to reapply and take the diver's test over again. When you hit 55 or 60 you'd be retested because of your age. If you didn't pass the new testing.......to bad old fogie, your diving days are over. Sounds like a good idea. NOT.

 

[Tigerman]

Personally, I think there should be a requirement to perform x dives in a given timeframe. If I dont dive in 10 years and dont brush up before I do the smart thing and jump into the water again, I dont think that cert card would be worth much...
Plenty of other certs has such requirements, interestingly one of the most dangerous one to hold, your drivers license, does not (atleast not around here)..
Making the courses tougher, nope, not in favour of that, but making it a requirement to stay "updated" to keep it, that I would like..

So "It depends, because..." what I said above.

 

[crpntr133]

It would be much better if the Advanced courses were really advanced and much tougher, much more book and pool work, much stricter swim standards, included introduction to rescue and nitrox, deeper diving and limited deco. The Basic OW course could remain much like it is, maybe tighten up a little bit on swim standards and introduce real world skills but it should remain a welcome mat and therefore not terribly intimidating. Advanced should mean your an accomplished diver with solid skills and watermanship.

It is the advanced courses that need to be "toughed" up. This would be good for the dive world because charter operators could then trust "advanced" divers to be able to actualy assemble their gear and get in and out of the water without nearly drowning--as I commonly see today by PadI Advanced and PadI Tech divers. The Advanced should proably take at leat 8 weeks (fours hours per week, half class and half pool) and include dives that challenge and demonstrate skills.

It is OK to flunk someone, they either rise to the challenge or move on to golf or keep working and succeed. If they are really interested they will put in the effort to succeed.

I took scuba in 68, it was a 12 week course, two nights a week, half pool and half lecture. You had to be able to swim, there were no BCs and we were using double hose regulators. Somewhere between that and the PadI online course with two hour pool checkout and dive in the local quarry or "referral" should exist a happy medium.

N

Boy how do I agree with this. I am one of those that the OW and AOW were a joke. Did I learn how to dive, yes. Was I able to do all skills, yes. Should the instructor have been tougher, YES.
Now I am looking at rescue and switched agencies and instructor. As of now I am planning on getting my butt kicked in this class. This instructor is a good instructor and will work with you to make you a better diver.
I know I will pass and I know that we will be working on areas that aren't my favorite. But guess what, if my AOW was a bit tougher then I would have learned them better back then. As it is now I have been doing a lot on my own.

I would be interested in seeing how many OW divers dive a couple times a year while on vacation. I know a ton of them. Go to a quarry and ask the OW class were they will be diving and most will say on vacation in X. Which is great. So make AOW more advanced for those that want to take this sport seriously.

 

[Thalassamania]

Making the classes "tougher" doesn't have to mean alienating the weaker divers. A tough class isn't push-ups in full gear it's a class that requires the divers to be competent by the time they finish the final certification dive. A good class will push individual students at their own pace providing encouragement and a slower pace to those who need it but increasing the challenge for the ones who seem to be "naturals." All the divers will end up being competent, the timid ones have a great sense of what they have accomplished if you make them meet a high standard but take them there slowly. The really motivated students can finish their certification dives looking like they've been diving much longer than they have. This is something that takes time and a willingness on the student's part to spend that time learning. Sometimes "tough" isn't because something is hard, it's because it requires a time commitment and a level of focus people aren't willing to commit to.
Ber

Well said. Some people on the board here see what I do as "tough" because it is demanding, time intensive and intellectually challenging. But they forget (I know that I've said this before) that most of my students have been students who are way more nerd and geek than SoCal beach lifeguard. What I do with them is often the first physically demanding and "life-threatening" experience of their life. Focus and commitment are, indeed, key.

Look, elitists, if the short courses that they are giving nowadays created a dangerous situation we'd have a s***load of beginning divers drowning. Scuba isn't all that complicated you know. If an old fart like me can jump into it like I did, anyone can do it.

As I observed above, almost anyone can do it ... but (at least in my opinion) short courses are not the answer competence is ... and that takes time (and focus and commitment).

I think you're operating on an erroneous assumption ... that instruction that placed more demands on the student would result in fewer divers.

It's generally stated in the industry that about 3 out of every 4 people who get certified rarely, if ever, dive again. One theory for why that happens is because they learn enough to go out and terrify themselves, post-class ... and decide that diving's not for them.

Make the class more comprehensive, give those people more tools to work with and more confidence in what they're doing, and you'll probably lose fewer of them.

I have found that people who develop a certain comfort level in the water tend to become more active divers. Those who never get beyond the level of needing the services of a dive professional to plan and lead their dives for them remain on the fringes of the activity ... or stop doing it altogether.

More demanding classes don't have to be like boot camp. They can be fun ... they just have to focus on the right things. I know several instructors who are demanding ... and yet rarely ever lose a student by expecting them to put effort into learning appropriate skills.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Using as a criteria for an "active diver" simply making 5 dives per year the best estimates that I seen are that there is an 80% dropout rate. That means that 1 diver out of 5 trained goes on to continue diving. If the average course today is 20 hours and has a drop out rate of 80% and a 100 hour course has no drop out rate (well some folks must drop out at some point but not untill after they bought a full set of gear and dove for some years) it seems to me that the industry would be, at worst, in the same shape.

An agency certification card is good enough, Mike; what more do you want to know?

No certification card is good enough, everyone does a checkout.

My OP was not phrased well at all.
There are some things that are not covered enough in class/pools. The less they cover, the higher the pass rate. Can we agree on that? Is that what's best for the dive industry? Does more certs mean more $$?
I chose the word "tough" in the OP but meant "comprehensive". I kid you not, there are some with certs who still can't remove and replace a mask without panicking. I do agree that classes should be longer and cover more. The testing needs improvement as well. If it takes you 5 minutes to get your buoyancy right once you reach bottom, you're not ready for the OW.
Anyway. My question is...If NATO's Scuba Police tested all divers and revoked c-cards from those that were a danger to themselves, others, or to the sealife because of their lack of skills, would that bother you or would you be happy that now they have to go get some better training?
Keep in mind, that if half the divers lose their certs, the dive industry loses a lot of money via sales and trips. I would see things getting more expensive so the LDS and charters won't starve.

Why revoke their cards? Downgrade them to learner's permits that require they dive with a (usually paid) leader.

...
It would, of course, require significantly more creativity and attention to fun than a by-the-book McCourse. ...

That's what was done for decades and is what many instructors today still do.

 

[The Horn]

All the certification "extra's"are a load of bunk.

Have a basic "vacation diving" certification for the people who just want to do a few shallow dives or under DM supervision

Open Water certification should qualify you to dive in all "OPEN Water" conditions to a depth and time that does not have a decompression obligation. This should include (but not limited to) boat, nav, night, shore, surf, drift etc and be particularly suited to your geographical area: Colder water means more gear (drysuit, 7mm wetsuits etc) Finning techniques, team work, types of gear etc etc

Advanced/Rescue/Master Diver/dive master should be one course, a good ball breaker that would eliminate those that should not progress to Instruction

Probably the biggest reason people who have diver training are looked upon as a poor diver is the lack of use of the skills they were taught, Look at many of the certifying agencies that turn out many many divers a year and they also have a VERY high percentage that will only dive a few times.

Other agencies that do not have as high a turn out normally will have a more dedicated student or those that are desireing to progress beyond the basic levels and will have many more dives.

These basic levels should be held at a much higher level than they are now.

The fact that many people who take GUE or DIR come out with a very different view on diving and a desire to work on and improve diving skills is because the initial courses they took were lacking many or some of the basic skill divers SHOULD be competant at.

It all boils down to the $$$$ both on the Agencies side and how much YOU are willing to pay for instruction but spending a lot of money to take a "cheap" course like some of the ones being offered is terrible

 

[rhadamantus]

all4: What the hell had driving a car got to do with scuba diving?

well sometimes, you need a car to get to the jump off point of the dive site.

 

[Thalassamania]

All the certification "extra's"are a load of bunk.

Have a basic "vacation diving" certification for the people who just want to do a few shallow dives or under DM supervision

Open Water certification should qualify you to dive in all "OPEN Water" conditions to a depth and time that does not have a decompression obligation. This should include (but not limited to) boat, nav, night, shore, surf, drift etc and be particularly suited to your geographical area: Colder water means more gear (drysuit, 7mm wetsuits etc) Finning techniques, team work, types of gear etc etc

Advanced/Rescue/Master Diver/dive master should be one course, a good ball breaker that would eliminate those that should not progress to Instruction

Probably the biggest reason people who have diver training are looked upon as a poor diver is the lack of use of the skills they were taught, Look at many of the certifying agencies that turn out many many divers a year and they also have a VERY high percentage that will only dive a few times.

Other agencies that do not have as high a turn out normally will have a more dedicated student or those that are desireing to progress beyond the basic levels and will have many more dives.

These basic levels should be held at a much higher level than they are now.

The fact that many people who take GUE or DIR come out with a very different view on diving and a desire to work on and improve diving skills is because the initial courses they took were lacking many or some of the basic skill divers SHOULD be competant at.

It all boils down to the $$$$ both on the Agencies side and how much YOU are willing to pay for instruction but spending a lot of money to take a "cheap" course like some of the ones being offered is terrible

What he said.

 

[Tigerman]

Anyone have the accident/fatality rates for recreational diving vs professional diving available? I seem to recall that the professionals have a higher accident rate than recreational divers...

For the record, I dont really see the problem with walking the stairs rather than taking the elevator straight to the top, but that just me..
Sure, I wouldnt mind having rescue as part of aow, but its not like I dont know its out there to take (hopefully during this fall). If the argument is that "operators cant rely on the cert" well guess what? Some people would pass the "tougher" courses you describe as well and be just as "unsafe".
I dont plan to dive nitrox at this time (mainly because of availability) so its no use for me to learn it and probably forget half of it before It IS an option..