AOW for Experienced Divers: An Open Letter to PADI

[ElGaucho]

Look there are a lot of things that are wrong with PADI as well as most recreational agencies (and it mainly has to do with the way they push the creation of bad and ill prepared instructors). But dividing the course into OW/AOW/Rescue is NOT one of them. I believe this is truly one of the great advantages. It allows people (divers) to really take the information bit by bit, instead of being forced into becoming a fanatic for diving from day zero (keeping the numbers of divers very low). This allows people to commit slowly into a hobby they might or might not like. It allows instructors to give quicker, less involving courses, which in turn allows them to via this same modularization, find different ways to teach classes and to assemble diving groups.

The flaw in the system is not being modular, it´s the bad instructors, as it has always been. Agencies DO have a very big chunk of responsibility for churning out so many bad instructors, granted. But it´s not the system, it´s the players at fault.

 

[DCBC]

I think PADI has "stacked the deck" with the course description, and the available courses....this has made it easy for law suit potentials to use the existing course structure and language, and this has created the "need" of people like Guy to be immorally forced into the AOW class.

I think PADI secretly enjoys that the lawyers will "drive" people to the mandated AOW class, and they can feign surprise and dismay.
If they cared what was right, they would create an "Equivalency" cert for people with skills far beyond 70% of their teaching instructors but that only had an OW card--divers like Guy.

It's not about the liability...it's about the profits ( a scheme like this that drives AOW certs for PADI Shops and Instructors, is profit for PADI --when each Instructor received their Instructor credentials, there was the implicit understanding that PADI would do "things" that would make them money)....Here you go!!!!

The standard diving course in the 70's was split into OW, AOW and Rescue by design. People could take a different program or take 3 PADI programs. This was a stroke of genius from a business perspective. PADI programs that were advertised for much less than the competitors. Unknowing Students naturally gravitated to PADI. At the time my LDS advertised courses for $300, while my PADI competitor advertised theirs for $99. Brilliant!

It wasn't until later that the Student saw that there was a difference. By this time they were hooked. With PADI it's all about the money (no bashing, just the God's truth as I see it). There's nothing the matter with this, but there are differences between the certification Agencies that Divers (and many Instructors) don't understand.

---------- Post added June 10th, 2013 at 11:16 AM ----------

...But dividing the course into OW/AOW/Rescue is NOT one of them. I believe this is truly one of the great advantages. It allows people (divers) to really take the information bit by bit, instead of being forced into becoming a fanatic for diving from day zero (keeping the numbers of divers very low). This allows people to commit slowly into a hobby they might or might not like. It allows instructors to give quicker, less involving courses, which in turn allows them to via this same modularization, find different ways to teach classes and to assemble diving groups.

That's certainly one read on the situation. For my part, this just allows a bunch of half-trained divers to be certified. "Modular" training works well if all modules are completed. If not, the training is incomplete. I agree however, that what is "required" for a diver to be trained is debatable. For me this definition includes full diver rescue. If you promote "the Buddy System" and the Diver isn't trained to save his Buddy underwater, there's a serious flaw imo...