Specialty Courses - not the usual question

[Scuba_Steve]

Actually, I agree with you ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I figured you would, I just didn't need to get into it with those that may disagree. I can only handle 6 or 7 scuffles at a time

But seriously, they really should attempt a re-write on madatory classes so everyone gets the opportunity to learn this, and not just yours and a few others students.

.....they do have to be approved by PADI. PADI thoroughly check out the distinctive and ensure that they do not negate good diving practice........

I find this statement downright funny.

 

[Gary D.]

Well, this is a bit of a twist on the regular questions about specialty courses...

I was reading the PADI website, www.padi.com, and was reading through the certification map, and read the specialty instrcutor page. It suggested that one (obviously an instructor) would be able to make up there own specialty course, write the materials for it and construct a curriculum, and then teach it!

:jawdrop:Is what I was reading correct??! If this is true, and you make someone pay for this course you invented, how is it accreditied with PADI? DO you just write to them and say "Here, I made up this specialty course, can you make it so I can say its accepted as a PADI specialty course"?

Seems a little incredulous to me...

anyone? thoughts?

Beej.w.

Why should that surprise you? This is how every one of the organizations got started and continue to grow. Someone gets an idea, puts it on paper, gets it approved and puts it into practice. This goes for about every kind of training out there.

A close by police department is the premier training department for Riot Control. Guess what, they have never had a riot. But they have done their homework and their classes are good ones. They sat down and compiled information from all over the world and now teach what they have learned.

Classes do not just appear out of the sky; someone has compile information and set it up so it can be passed onto others.

Like anything else, some are very good, some are OK and others suck. But someone has to get the ball rolling.

Gary D.

 

[TSandM]

Actually, one of the best dive classes I have taken to date, in terms of how much it enriched my enjoyment of diving, was a PADI "Distinctive Specialty" created by an instructor from the shop where I got certified. It's a Pacific Northwest Marine Life ID course that runs four three-hour lectures and four dives, and it's fabulous. Laurel has over 3000 dives in the PNW (I suspect almost all of them with a camera) and he has slides of everything that lives here, as an egg, a juvenile, an adult, reproducing, hunting, you name it. He knows a tremendous amount about the habits of the creatures -- what they eat, what kinds of habitats they prefer, etc. -- and you learn a huge amount from the class.

He also has another distinctive specialty which I am going to take, because it will amuse me to have an almost unique card: Underwater cartography. I'll help Peter with his DM mapping project, and earn the card that way

 

[Tom Smedley]

Bob

Your gas management course would be an outstanding distinctive specialty course. One that I would like to take.

Alas - a round-trip ticket to the PNW would make it an expensive one though.

 

[beejw]

Thanks guys..

the only reason this surprised me is that, i assumed that it was the course directors that wrote all the specialties etc...

from what ive heard now it makes perfect sense.

 

[Jorbar1551]

dont you also have to be a course director also?

 

[mrjimboalaska]

I have a buddy/Instructor that put together the Kayak diver specialty for PADI. I believe that it is going to expand beyond local specialty statis......

 

[Diving Doc]

dont you also have to be a course director also?

No, it can be written by an instructor, but he must have significant numbers of dives in that area.

 

[Fabulous]

An example in Australia is Reg Lipson's courses in Marine Biology.

A must if you want to learn about the things you see.

A sensational bloke who has over 10000 hours of dive experience.

 

[Diving Doc]

A sensational bloke who has over 10000 hours of dive experience.

My hero.

That is just fantastic