3 Day wonder certifications

[Genesis]

Sure everyone has different boundaries when it comes to taking risk, but have you stopped to consider that the students taking resort courses are not fully able to judge the risks?

I think you need to see someone (and if you really want a dose of reality, make sure that someone is your buddy) coughing up lung tissue and then come back to this question again and answer it yourself.

I have, in fact, posted here about the "state of training" and my personal experience with watching others who I care about being "taught to dive."

That does not change the fact that for adults we are all free to make our own choices and to calibrate our own risk profiles.

It is not my place to do that for ANYONE other than myself.

 

[Rick Inman]

NWGratefulDiver once bubbled...
Those divers who are interested in becoming good divers will seek out the knowledge they require one way or another ... usually with follow-on classes and by seeking out dive buddies they can learn from. That's my experience anyway, having mentored dozens such divers coming right out of OW class.

Yeah, considering my resent experience with a PADI class, I agree. 3 days or 6 weeks, it doesn't much mater. Four dives with someone like Bob (NWGratefulDiver) will teach a willing student more than any OW class.

 

[Tom R]

Dive Source once bubbled...
This is dangerous ground but I am going wade in and try not to offend too many people.


We have competitors in Toronto who really push these weekend programs for all of their training. They use catch lines like "learn to dive in a weekend gaurenteed." and while some certainly can do it, I feel many people cannot and don't like to see them given a false sense of security.

Your lucky to have some one teach the whole weekend, I know people in Ontario teaching the same course on Sat and Sun morning complete with fully completed worksheets as the classroom sessions, and you guess it, cheaper then anyone else.

Tom

 

[kwesler]

the issue is length of course. OW SCUBA, with the right instructor, student, preparation and discipline, can be taught in 3 days. It is really the beginning of becoming a diver.

The problem is that C-cards are given for TAKING the course, rather than PASSING the course.

All teaching, whether SCUBA, social studies, drivers' ed etc. should be goal oriented-learn the material to the standard of the course, rather than task oriented-show up at the prescribed time.

My $.02

Ken

 

[pipedope]

Some people will learn enough in the 3 day class to be on their way to becoming safer divers. Some people will need more time to get the skills down. It is also not really a question of time for some people but number of sessions.

Has anyone here ever had the experience where they just couldn't get a skill to work right even with hours of practice. Then they give up, go home, eat dinner, sleep and then the next day the skill is done easily and correctly?

Sometimes ya gotta 'sleep on it' for the skill to transfer into parts of the brain where it will really work.

I don't think there is any such thing as a "safe diver". Some divers are safer than others but if you go in the water you are taking a risk.
Making a diver safer and keeping them safer is a process that never ends. The moment you think you have it all down then you go from being a safer diver to being a more dangerous diver.

Ongoing training, study and practice is a way of life for the safer diver.

 

[kwesler]

emphasized a point I was trying to make in a much clearer way...

Getting an OW card is the BEGINNING, not the end. IMHO, there IS no end...you either stay a student of the sport, or your skills begin to degrade. Just like business-you either move forward or backward-there is not staying in one spot.

Ken

PS Besides, if you are not excited enough to want to keep improving and learning, what is the point?!

 

[Capt Jim Wyatt]

pipedope once bubbled...
Some people will learn enough in the 3 day class to be on their way to becoming safer divers. Some people will need more time to get the skills down. It is also not really a question of time for some people but number of sessions.

Indeed.

I have trained divers in 3 days and they are fine so long as they dive in the environment they were trained in.

I always tell them if they plan to dive in another environment they need to get the requisite training for that environment.

 

[pipedope]

Right now I almost need a tune up for diving in open water with good vis.

Doing working dives in mud soup for so long that many of my rec skills are rusty.

Man, it can get scary seeing all those critters swimming around me.

 

[cmcarver]

I think the key to these classes are that there are two certifications they could be talking about in being certified in one weekend. The first being Padi Scuba Certified then there is Padi Open Water Certified. It is a lot easier to pass someone as the Scuba Certified which doesn't require the open water checkout dives.

I beleive the Padi Scuba Certified is just the Classroom and Pool. I don't remember fully but I think that gets you a cert that no one will really trust unless you use it to practice with a Instructor before you OW.

 

[kwesler]

I believe that is a "curriculum", but my LDS DOES offer a "VIP" 3-day course that is full OW, pending successful completion of the OW dives, which they do in the local quarry. In other words, you can get a full OW cert in 5 days-3 class and pool and two diving. The structure is night class day one, pool and class day two, pool and class (including "final") day three, then two days of diving.

That is how I did my training. Fortunately for me, I am the anal retentive chef, and had practically memorized the book before I came to classes. Now that I think about it, the LDS required that we complete the book and the excercises before the classes began, so we began the classes by handing in our end of chapter tests. That began the discussion.

I put the class together with a few friends and family, so we were all focused on doing a good job.

In addition, I went off and did my first diving with my koolaid drinkin' tech diver buddy who has some VERY high standards, which he insisted upon for me....

Ken