Diving Education Today

[Peter Guy]

Thal wrote

I love a woman with good taste.

Just thought I'd add, Me too -- especially THAT woman!

Gcb made a comment (somewhat negative) about a local training site -- well, yes, diving it in a wetsuit can be "an adventure" -- especially the 2nd dive when the temps are near, or below, freezing. That's when the instructor(s) perhaps need to rearrange the schedule to just one dive/day.

But it may also require an instructor to think about the REAL goals of the OW dives -- which, to my way of thinking, are to allow the student to demonstrate their competence AND to show the student why diving can be so darn much fun.

The other day I took a student on his very first dive, cold water, drysuit (1 prior experience in the pool) and great (i.e. 10 feet) viz. We both had a fabulous dive -- saw, and played with, a ratfish (I LOVE ratfish),

beautiful alabaster nudi

and numerous crabs amongst other things. The student came out of the water really jazzed.

OTOH, I've also been with students who were directed to kneel with the result of kicking up clouds and, quite frankly, never seeing much of anything at all.

It is up to the instructor to do what he can to enhance the experience.

 

[BDSC]

Your students may not be so lucky...

Richard,

I didn't know you were an instructor!

 

[boulderjohn]

So back to the basic discussion. Diving education today... will changing it also change the fact that a big % of divers starting to dive only do it for a short while to sniff it and say been there done that? Divers that don't progress or are satisfied with once a year 5 tropical dives? I really don't know. I do believe that the ones where the bug bit... will get there... they will inform themselves, start diving locally just out of I WANT TO DIVE AND 5-25 DIVES A YEAR IS NOT NEARLY ENOUGH, start getting gear adjusted to local diving, start knowing the local diving community.... etc

Colorado is, depending upon where you read it, anywhere from 1st to 3rd in the number of certified dives per capita. Yet, we have almost no local diving to speak of, and our state motto should probably be that we are just a plane flight away from great diving. The best diving we have to offer in the Denver area are shallow, silt-bottomed reservoirs with little more than crayfish emerging from the bottom gloom for visual stimulation. At least 95% of the divers leave the state for diving vacations, and they aren't going to cold water sites all that often.

When I teach an OW class, it is usually just the academics and the pool, with the students taking my referral to some tropical destination. I do certify some OW divers in a local reservoir in the summer, and we take some to out of state destination, but most of them are referrals to far off places. When I talk to students at the start of class, the majority of them are getting certified in anticipation of a single vacation.

Maybe they will continue after that. Maybe they won't. There are many factors involved with that decision.

I also do refresher classes, and many of them were certified years ago, did some dives, liked it, but then things happened. John Lennon said that life is what happens when you're busy making other plans, and that is what it was for these people. Frequently it is raising a family that intervenes and brings different priorities, including different vacations. For a long period of time, my life with my children focused on soccer and baseball games and other activities that kept me far away from anything even resembling diving.

I don't see anything wrong with this, and that is probably why the diver retention figures don't concern me as much as they concern others. If people are getting certified with the intention of being occasional vacation divers, I have no problem with that. If their lives take them in different directions, I hope they enjoy those new directions.

That was my plan as well. When I originally got certified, my wife and I were planning that we would vacation every other year in a tropical area that would provide scuba opportunities, and I thought I would dive a couple days out of each biannual vacation. I got hooked, and we have since done many more dive centered vacations than originally planned. My non-diving wife has been a real sport about this, but she reminds me that there are places we can go that do not have diving, and I go along and torture myself with my errant golf shots to balance it out.

So, I do not see anything wrong with people starting their diving lives this way, and I don't think that the fact that many do not continue is a condemnation of their training. It is just how their life is progressing.

 

[dmoore19]

Colorado is, depending upon where you read it, anywhere from 1st to 3rd in the number of certified dives per capita. Yet, we have almost no local diving to speak of, and our state motto should probably be that we are just a plane flight away from great diving. The best diving we have to offer in the Denver area are shallow, silt-bottomed reservoirs with little more than crayfish emerging from the bottom gloom for visual stimulation. At least 95% of the divers leave the state for diving vacations, and they aren't going to cold water sites all that often.

When I teach an OW class, it is usually just the academics and the pool, with the students taking my referral to some tropical destination. I do certify some OW divers in a local reservoir in the summer, and we take some to out of state destination, but most of them are referrals to far off places. When I talk to students at the start of class, the majority of them are getting certified in anticipation of a single vacation.

Maybe they will continue after that. Maybe they won't. There are many factors involved with that decision.

I also do refresher classes, and many of them were certified years ago, did some dives, liked it, but then things happened. John Lennon said that life is what happens when you're busy making other plans, and that is what it was for these people. Frequently it is raising a family that intervenes and brings different priorities, including different vacations. For a long period of time, my life with my children focused on soccer and baseball games and other activities that kept me far away from anything even resembling diving.

I don't see anything wrong with this, and that is probably why the diver retention figures don't concern me as much as they concern others. If people are getting certified with the intention of being occasional vacation divers, I have no problem with that. If their lives take them in different directions, I hope they enjoy those new directions.

That was my plan as well. When I originally got certified, my wife and I were planning that we would vacation every other year in a tropical area that would provide scuba opportunities, and I thought I would dive a couple days out of each biannual vacation. I got hooked, and we have since done many more dive centered vacations than originally planned. My non-diving wife has been a real sport about this, but she reminds me that there are places we can go that do not have diving, and I go along and torture myself with my errant golf shots to balance it out.

So, I do not see anything wrong with people starting their diving lives this way, and I don't think that the fact that many do not continue is a condemnation of their training. It is just how their life is progressing.

You just described me! Living in Colorado, Denver Area, doesn't supply you with many options for local diving. I did my certification dives at Chatfield Res. I haven't be back there since. I was certified last year and have done 1 dive vacation and will complete another one over the holidays this year. Scuba has taken a role of prominance in my plans, I guess I got bit! I feel like I was trained well enough to plan and execute a dive with a buddy in warm clear water. I know I don't know much, I plan on getting +/- 50 dives prior to taking the AOW course, I want to make sure I am proficient at routine <60fsw dives before proceeding with further training.

I am 50+ years old, (kind of scary considering the Max age touted here is 40 when bad things start happening). As a inexperienced apprentice I find a lot of the posts here disturbing! Some would want me to belive that I have no business underwater without taking an extended length course with double digit certification dives in 45 degree water. That is not what I became certified for. I certified so I could go to those vacation places with warm, clear water and look at coral and fish.

Diving, the way I see it is for fun, relaxation and a thrilling insight into the marine world. I don't see myself in a drysuit diving in <50 degree water. If I change my mind I will seek the knowledge and skills needed to do so. I too see nothing wrong with diving this way, and it has nothing to do with the efficiency of my training, it's just the way I want to do it. Thanks

 

[boulderjohn]

I did my certification dives at Chatfield Res. I haven't be back there since.

What? How have you manged to resist the allure of seeing that submerged shopping cart and the toilet half buried at the silt on the bottom (all of 21 feet)?

 

[Kingpatzer]

Put a plastic skeleton on the toilet and you've pretty well got it all . . .

 

[rstofer]

Richard,

I didn't know you were an instructor!

I'm not! I certainly have never claimed to be and nothing I have posted should ever give that impression. The closest I ever came was to say that I am not an instructor but if I were, it would be with NAUI.

I think this was just an oops by the poster. Or an 'imperial' you (any generic instructor happening by) but not specifically me.

Richard

 

[rstofer]

I have a question for you. Do you think you would have handled that o-ring problem as well as you did on your first dive after open water? In this case, presume it was at 59' and during the day, of course... It wasn't necessarily your training that prepared you to deal with an emergency, it was the 100 dives after that, that allowed you top become comfortable on the water and confident in your abilities to deal with problems. What is being argued here is that it is possible to get to that comfort level during training, under controlled conditions. You were lucky that nothing requiring the ability to deal with a crisis happened in those first hundred dives. Your students may not be so lucky...

That is a good question! I don't know what would have happened had it occurred right after OW I. Of course that would have made it during OW II so I would have had an instructor.

I don't think I tend to panic. I spent a lot of time in my youth doing things that should have resulted in my demise. I'm still here; others are not. Luck had a lot to do with it. Skill did not.

I would like to credit my training and in particular my instructor. If nothing else, he drilled in the idea that it is easier to fix things on the bottom.

But I won't belittle the advantage of 100 dives. I spent nearly every weekend in the water. What a great life! Then again, I'm not convinced that simulating this in a pool is in any way related to having it happen in open water. Now, I'll concede that the water was warm and that tends to keep the stress level down. I don't know how it would have worked out in cold water. Maybe the 100 dives would have still been the determining factor. People survive blown o-rings all the time (I guess).

No, I don't think you get to the comfort level of 100 dives by spending more time in the pool. I think you get there by making 100 dives. I think you get there by taking a lengthy program lasting about 3 months. I'm certainly nobody special and a less capable swimmer than many. But training and experience helps. So does a great dive buddy! Right there if I needed help...

And it's better to fix problems on the bottom.

Richard

 

[rstofer]

I am 50+ years old, (kind of scary considering the Max age touted here is 40 when bad things start happening).

If you find it disturbing, think about me! I turned 64 last Monday. But there are divers much older than me and I don't think they give it a moment's thought. The only thing I try to do is keep the exertion within my capabilities.

That's the thing about statistics. They're probably absolutely correct and 100% irrelevant.

Richard

 

[FishOutUvH2O]

so why is it that I'm troubled?

I don't mean to sound like an grumpy old guy who's caught in the past. I know things change, but they have only seemed to change within the sport diving field.

So, has anything in the 40 pages of this thread shed any more light on your original questions/concerns?

I just learned to dive last year, so I really have nothing to add that you probably don't already know. I will say, that based on my own instruction (after listening to other's, I'm thinking I just got lucky with a good instructor), and now a couple of hundred dives, I feel I was given the necessary skills, info, and basic building blocks to be a safe and competent diver within the limits that PADI recommended at the OW level. I also assumed, right or wrong, that after OW it was my responsibility to both know my own limits and to take what I had learned and increase my proficiency at the basic skills through practice (use it or loose it), as well as, expand my knowledge and training if I chose to dive in a manner requiring more advanced skills. So, while it may be easy to call the training agencies and the manufacturers/retailers greedy and put the blame on them, I still think a lot of it has to do with personal responsibility. I also wonder how much of the change in training standards are just the natural refinement that tends to happen to most activities. In the beginning not much is known, so everything is planned and trained for. But, after experience is gained and new methods/equipment developed, refinements to training and necessary skills are often made. Maybe one of you Ol' Timers can touch on that specifically. If this was said earlier, I apologize to the poster, I didn't read all 40 pages.