A career as a dive instructor - realistic or idealistic?

[Willie]

I HAVE PASSED MY IE!!!!!!!!!!
HOLY COW!
I'm walking on sunshine, (so to speak!)
I'm soooooooooo happy!!!! I just got back from open water exams 1 hour ago....got a 5 and a 3.8.... that means I'm through!!!

The examiner debriefed us earlier...and said something that really stuck in my head. That there is no good or bad or "better" instructor...we all start off the same and make our choices along the way. It's all about attitude. So my attitude is that I will treat people and teach people the way I would like to be taught. (Which involves a lot of fun!!) I will also develop new skills along the way to stay fresh and "employable"...ie skipper licence, repairs. etc. Progress never stops, and neither will I

Fantastic Lisa, congratulations! I have followed your thread from day one. Very encouraging. You should be quite proud of yourself. You are right about the attitude. Rely on the good training you obviously received and your good attitude. The experience will come.

I remember my first instructor job (flight instructor). There were about 45 other instructors with a wide variety of background and experience. I was a bit intimidated at first. It didnt take long though to find that I had gotten very good training, I was well received by my students, and after having a few students get excellent reviews from the examiners, I was on my way. Continued teaching for 22 years. It took me quite a few years before there was any money in it, but my family never went hungry. It was an excellent career - worth all the time and effort. I pray that you will find the same with your diving career.

From reading your posts, it sounds like you will make it wherever you plant yourself.

Congratulations again!

Willie

 

[Scotty g]

And congrats again from me Lisa. Well done to you! Keep us informed on your hangover status and your next move!

Scott

 

[mislav]

Congrats Lisa!

Can you believe the news - military coup attempt in Thailand!

 

[CJ Waid]

I am working on becoming an instructor too. I am a personal trainer, I plan on selling my personal training clients on taking up scuba diving once I get in that position. Sometimes you have to make things work, to make things work. I pick up about 10 new personal training clients a month, my average week for personal training is 6-8 hours a day, training a different client every hour, and maybe a couple appointments on Saturday. I am pretty sure I can talk about a third to half of them into scuba diving courses, so that's an extra few hundred bucks a month, plus I can talk with the other trainers clients (I don't think they will care, we all talk to each others clients about everything we do on the weekends anyway, we just don't talk to them about the training stuff unless it is our client) then I am going to make arrangements with resorts, dive shops, and anywhere else to try and fill up my schedule with teaching and leading dives. The way I figure it, it should take about 3 month and I will have a full boat of students and dive side jobs to do, I might even have to talk a buddy into certifying as an instructor to help out, which would be pretty cool.

I think it is all in the planning. My instructor told me he has a part time dive instructor that he paid $14,000 in one summer for teaching part time, and he said that there are people who get certified to teach, just so they can say they are...

if you work hard at anything, even if it is selling pet rocks, you can make a lot of money. Just love what you are doing, and want to do your job, and the money will come. Good Luck, I can't wait until I am ready to do the instructor thing.

 

[birdwrasse]

i think i'm headed in the same direction! not sure where i want to move to, yet... tell me more about IDC... were you able to get it all done in one fail swoop? how long? etc...

thanks,


--carlos

Wow, James, that was profound. And...funnily enough I am feeling pretty profound at the moment...as.. I HAVE PASSED MY IE!!!!!!!!!!
HOLY COW!
I'm walking on sunshine, (so to speak!)
I'm soooooooooo happy!!!! I just got back from open water exams 1 hour ago....got a 5 and a 3.8.... that means I'm through!!!

The examiner debriefed us earlier...and said something that really stuck in my head. That there is no good or bad or "better" instructor...we all start off the same and make our choices along the way. It's all about attitude. So my attitude is that I will treat people and teach people the way I would like to be taught. (Which involves a lot of fun!!) I will also develop new skills along the way to stay fresh and "employable"...ie skipper licence, repairs. etc. Progress never stops, and neither will I

Ok, now I have to go and get REALLY REALLY DRUNK!!!
Thanks everyone for all your support so far! I will continue this story onto the second chapter!!
xxxx
LISA

 

[Sirenita]

Just woke up with a raging hangover.
No idea how I got home last night.
However I do remember being in a bar in Pattaya at some point last night when the military coup news came onto the tv's and the music stopped.
We had more important things on our mind, however, like the fact that our IDC instructors had handcuffed all of us together for an hour, and someone had to go for a wee.

 

[orangelemon]

Nice one, I am glad your IE party didnt involve a snorkel, forget the skippers licence, unless it really interests you, I say wait for your teaching status to come through and get teaching 'real' people.

Apparently this is the 49th Coup in Thailand, the only change here is everyone is on the beach as there is a Public holiday and everything is shut.

Congratulations, and now the education really begins ....................

 

[Sirenita]

http://www.learn-in-asia.com/idc_september_2006_pattaya_thailand.htm

Check this out for our group IDC/IE photo and the smile on my face when I'm posing with my certificate!

 

[Willie]

Check this out for our group IDC/IE photo and the smile on my face when I'm posing with my certificate!

Quite a few smiles on that page. Lot's of proud people.

Willie

 

[andydiver06]

Nice Snaps. So Desi the fun guy and Claus the Serious guy were your IDC instructors. What are your plans now? Did you finish your EFRI also ? Has SteveB offered you a job ? Anyway you will have hardly any prob as your story has a big following in SB. Best of luck in keep on posting your adventures.