Forbin's Descent
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I guess if you consider my demeanor in the thread hostile then I’m hostile.
Advanced Open Water Disappointment
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Try Googling "tenacity wins." It is a standard business and leadership practice. A Best Practice. You need to do a little homework before you make your claims, if you want to have any credibility.
Do you disagree?
Look at the context.
1. I said that if you wanted to convince the scuba industry that it needs to make the kinds of major changes being suggested in this thread, it needs to show evidence.
2. Erik Sedlesky said this very thread was evidence:
3. I suggested that in the context of well over a million certifications a year, the unsupported opinions of "15-20" people on ScubaBoard did not constitute much evidence.
4. I was challenged to identify those 15-20.
5. I relied that my 15-20 number was an overestimation. I then identified the people who seemed to be against the current system, and I labeled them as "hostile." Perhaps you would have preferred a different word, but that's the one I chose.
6. In summary, It turns out the the voices in the thread "his thread about how AOW is falling apart and the scuba world as we know it is having a nuclear meltdown!" belong almost entirely to 3 people who wrote about 40% of the posts and created the illusion of a massive movement.
I'm not sure I've ever met a Scuba Instructor who doesn't think AOW is mostly a joke. Unless they're a course director, since they've drunk their respective agency's koolaid. That's an apocryphal assessment, and you're free to your unsupported opinion that it's doing great. I mean, if the goal is to separate money from clients, then "well over a million certifications" is all the proof you need, n'est pas? C'est la vie et la mort en trois quarts de temps...
You've met me, and I don't think AOW is a joke, and I'm not a course director.
Now, some instructors are a joke...but that is a different issue.
My experience is that those who really dislike AOW had faulty expectations of what the course is: it is a sampler, and it does not make you an advanced diver, nor even an expert in a subect.
- If you already know how to use a compass, at least your should learn how many of your fin kicks it takes to go 100 ft, and how important (and hard) it is to keep the compass level while swimming in open water.
- If you've never been below 60 ft and don't actually think about NDL or gas usage, you should pick up some improved planning skills and practice using them.
- Your three electives should allow you to (variously):
- improve you weighting, trim, and kicks (PPB)
- learn about some different fish and their habitats and behaviours (Fish ID)
- learn about how most of the living stuff you see underwater is animals, not plants (Naturalist)
- learn some useful search patterns, how to manage them, and which knots are best to use with a lift bag...and practice with the lift bag
- if you never been on a boat, some marine terminology, locations of critical geear (like fire extinguishers and life jackes),best practices for stowing gear, existing/entering a boat, and maybe how to avoid sea-sickness
- If you are diving in cold water, the basics of drysuit use and some practice in using it
- how to take underwater photographs that are worth looking at twice
- how to swim safely around/outside a wreck and investigate its openings for possible penetration
- try out a DPV and learn how not to hurt yourself using it
- learn some initial aspects of cavern diving, inlcuding line/reel use and emergency procedures
- try out some under-ice diving
- do a night dive managing your buoyancy, proper light signals, compass use at night
- get a head start on the Rescue course with some book work and dives
- basic aspects of sidemount, both one-tank and two-tank
- etc
or needed. 9 of those electives don't need an instructor.
I made my AOW classes interesting, relevant, and challenging. Or, at least, I think I did. Like for the fish ID class, I made them register on Reef.org, watch the fish ID video for the area and have them show proof they did two surveys. To me, that's making their fish ID experience relevant.
Most of the AOW classes I witnessed, did not. They did a dive on a reef, asked if they IDed x number of fish and that was it. On a deep or night dive, they followed them around with little to no instruction to augment the experience. In that respect, they obviously did not see any real value in AOW, except to get more certs under their belts. I have not seen you teach an AOW class, so you're obviously not a part of my experience pool. But I lived in Key Largo for a number of years and saw soooo many classes. Sure, some instructors would talk a big game, but too many were too lazy and no one seemed to check on them.
So, in your esteemed opinion, all instructors must know everything about all pieces of equipment, all manufacturers, etc. in order to be considered competent?
I get it. You were trying to make a joke. It failed. Accept that and move on. You had a bad experience with a shop and continued to go back for more abuse. Now you're trying to provide your experience as evidence of widespread incompetence in instructing. It's not. It's evidence that you had a bad experience. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Experiences are quite personal. Ergo, it's important for us to be able to read a number of them from all viewpoints. Taken together, they might indicate a trend or a concern. Let's not dismiss them just because they don't jive with our experience(s).
As an example, in my mind that there are cards given out for achieving a modicum of trim and buoyancy is an indictment of what's not taught in OW by every agency who offers such. How can you award an OW card without them having "mastery" of this skill? I have yet to get a satisfactory answer from any agency head on this, and I have asked. One of my more popular workshops was my "Trim, Buoyancy, and Propulsion", but it was remedial. It was given to all those divers who didn't master it in their OW, and there was certainly no card given for it. In fact, NASE doesn't offer such a card for that very reason.
It's my opinion that every agency has room for improvement. Every stinking one. What may not be important to you, might be anathema to someone else. Identifying areas which should be improved is not agency bashing as some would like to suggest. I think it's important to be able to discuss what we like and what we don't like about the agencies and the industry as a whole. No one has to listen, but it would be nice if they did.
You are absolutely correct. However, an individual's experience is just one data point. If we gather enough of these data points we can begin to understand trends and patterns, and then make necessary adjustments. We cannot, however, simply make blanket statements that all instruction is a worthless money grab foisted on unsuspecting students by greedy agencies and incompetent instructors. And, even if that was the case, posting about an IDC candidate asking for jacket-style BCD recommendations for teaching as supposed evidence of widespread instructional incompetence is just plain stupid. And I suspect that he knew that when he posted it.
I have no issue whatsoever with folks having serious debate about the need for instructional reforms and alterations to standards. Nor do I have a problem with people chiming in and saying that their individual experiences were good or bad. For what it's worth, I am in the camp that believes some changes should be made. I do, however, have a huge problem with a poster who makes blanket statements about all training without providing any evidence to support his position, and then, when asked to provide evidence, provides a Facebook post of someone simply asking for equipment recommendations.
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