Assistance in Choosing & Beginning Professional Level Courses - DM

[Cabub]

Dear Dive Community,

Good day to all and I hope all is well with everyone. First off, please forgive me if this post is in the wrong forum as I am kind of new to the whole “Forum” thing.

It was once said, “a wise man seeks the counsel of others” and since there is a wealth of knowledge and experience among all of you I wanted to seek some “expert” advice regarding my ongoing and continued dive training/education. The whole of my life I have wanted to be a dive professional both in the recreational and technical aspects of diving. I have completed my Rescue, EFR & 1^st Aid/CPR courses and recently hit the century mark – 100 logged dives and my skills as well as confidence that accompanies when a certain level of competency has been achieved, has brought me, I believe, to the point where I want to begin my professional level training. In a little over four years I will be in a position and ready to make my career change and transition from my current occupation to the dive industry, therefore, I have a four years to learn and work my way through the PADI Instructor levels, specialty instructor qualifications, industry specific business/operations, as well as the various Technical disciplines with both Type R & Type T Rebreather use and instruction being what I am most interested. Now, the geographic region of the United States where I reside, I am three hours from the nearest water (really stinks especially for my passions) and there is only one LDS where I live and they only sell one brand of dive equipment and since I don’t like and dive everything that particular company manufactures coupled with not buying 100% of my equipment from them, they will not teach me anything beyond recreational which I have already completed. Pretty silly, huh?

One of my questions are, would it be prudent to wait to begin my DM and subsequent instructor level courses until I am 100% ready to make my career change and do it all at once as I do not have a place to keep up with the skills learned, i.e., assisting with classes, working with students, etc.? Or should I go a head and begin my professional level training and do what I can with what I can until I am able to make my career transition?

Another question I have is when researching the plethora of training facilities and options available, what specific questions should I be asking the Course Directors to aid in narrowing down my choices of where I will be completing all my training. I know I want to find a facility/instructor that teaches both the recreational and technical courses I am interested in learning and teaching.

I will be spending a lot of time and resources to complete my training due to where I live, as I will have to travel, which I do not mind nor will I hesitate to spend such resources in order to achieve my goals. That being said, I want to find a dive training facility that is not only professional in the way they conduct their operations, but attentive to the individuals needs as we all have our strengths & weaknesses. Additionally, it is important to me their training philosophies are such they actually “Teach” the skills and not just teach to pass a test or examination. They need not only to be a good fit for me, but I for them as well. Above and beyond these specifics, what other questions should I ask to ascertain that we would be a good fit for one another?

To all of you who take the time out of your busy day to reply to this thread to assist me in achieving one of my life long dream, a big heartfelt - THANK YOU!!!!!

“Every man dies, the only question is, how well will he really live”

“Courage is daring to take that fist step, or a different path. It is the decision to place your dreams above your fears.”

 

[boulderjohn]

You are asking a lot of questions in here. Let me see if I can tackle one or two of them here.

Let's start with this:

Now, the geographic region of the United States where I reside, I am three hours from the nearest water (really stinks especially for my passions) and there is only one LDS where I live and they only sell one brand of dive equipment and since I don’t like and dive everything that particular company manufactures coupled with not buying 100% of my equipment from them, they will not teach me anything beyond recreational which I have already completed.

Judging from your zip code in your profile, I wonder if the nearest water might be the Blue Hole in New Mexico. If so, that is very limiting in one sense but inviting in another. The Blue Hole is not really much of dive site if you want to get into advanced diving and technical diving in particular, but there is another site only a couple of miles away that is used for technical training regularly. You cannot get into it without working with one of the few instructors authorized to dive there. If that is indeed your location and you are interested in learning more, contact me privately.

Next, the big question for you is are you planning to continue to live in your present location during the next four years, with only that one unsatisfactory shop nearby? If so, then you are going to have to plan on traveling for your training. Believe it or not, I know someone who did his technical training through a shop in Boulder, CO while living in Amarillo, TX. (Meeting most of the time in New Mexico.) If you really want such training badly enough, then you will probably need to travel to do it. Ideally, you should be traveling to an area where you would ultimately want to work. Are you looking at South Texas or something more exotic?

---------- Post Merged at 05:31 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 03:29 PM ----------

I'll tackle another issue:

One of my questions are, would it be prudent to wait to begin my DM and subsequent instructor level courses until I am 100% ready to make my career change and do it all at once as I do not have a place to keep up with the skills learned, i.e., assisting with classes, working with students, etc.? Or should I go a head and begin my professional level training and do what I can with what I can until I am able to make my career transition?

I would not do the DM training until I knew a shop I really wanted to work with. Once you've found that, you can take your time. If you don't think you will be doing it for four years, then it would be wise to wait.

You said you also wanted to do technical diving. Believe me, technical diving takes longer than DM. Start that now if you can find a good place to to train.

 

[Cabub]

John,

I will be living in my present location for the next four years as I will not be ready to make the transition, career change, until then. I am resigned to the fact that I will have to travel extensively to achieve all my goals and I do not mind spending the necessary time and resources to do so in order to achieve the goals I have set for myself. That being said, it is paramount that I find a training facility/instructor that is professional, thorough and not only the right fit for me but I for them. It is for this reason I am seeking counsel and spending so much time researching all my options.

You pretty much confirmed my suspicion in the "I'll tackle another issue" section that it would be prudent that I wait until I am 100% ready to make the career transition to begin my DM and instructor level courses and in the meantime begin my technical training as I understand it will take longer and be really in depth. Therefore, I thought about beginning the training now, as soon as I found the right instructor. As far as the technical training, I am more interested in the "right" instructor than I am where they are located or where I do my training. For my DM and instructor level courses I want to go to Florida, California (I have brother who lives there and could save me some money on lodging) or overseas.

 

[Rogersea]

Cabub,

Are you in the military right now, expecting to retire in four years? IF so I would start the tech diving now and delay DM and Instructor Training until about 6 months before you retire...


If you are not about to retire with an income, I would rethink entry into the diving profession as there is currently a glut of Instructors making it difficult to earn a decent living for the majority of SCUBA Instructors. I would be happy to discuss this via email or pm..

Cheers,
Roger

 

[Cabub]

I thank you for your reply as it is deeply appreciated!!

No sir I am not in the Military, of which is one of the biggest regrets of my life, and I agree 100% with your assessment regarding how saturated the industry is with instructors hence the industry can be and is highly competitive therefore more difficult to earn a decent living. Be that as it may, I am going to continue to pursue my goals of working in the industry as my goals are not entirely tied the money but rather because I love industry, every aspect of it, and for this reason I am going to pursue so many different aspects of diving, i.e., recreational, technical, ecology, etc. For example, I believe rebreathers are on the cusp of being more mainstream in that the technology of the machines are significantly improving as manufactures are making them safer, easier for the "non-tekkies" to dive them and as the price becomes comes down and they begin to be more affordable and when more and more places begin to put in place the infrastructure for rebreather support they will begin to be more and more common thus there will be a further need for instructors, maintenance/repair technicians, etc.

Again, I thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to respond to my thread by offering me your insight. I greatly value all counsel. Thank you.

 

[TSandM]

It is my personal opinion that a DM or instructor ought to be an exemplary diver, capable of providing an excellent role model for students. This means superb buoyancy control, elegant technique, broad experience, and a thorough understanding of and wide exposure to diving theory. Therefore, my advice would be to get all the training and experience you can before beginning your professional level classes. Expose yourself to as many diving environments as you can . . . one of the things that becomes obvious here on SB is that people whose experience is limited to one environment often don't understand the imperatives of another. Maybe get some tech training, or do a cavern or cave class . . . get a taste of what the standards are for more demanding diving than OW, and why those standards are the way they are.

You will come back to your professional training with a whole different perception of what you are trying to accomplish, and what you CAN accomplish with students (assuming you teach). JMHO.

 

[Cabub]

Sir,

Absolutely well said and I agree 100% as I believe good divers and especially divemasters and instructors should be well rounded and not one dimensional as that is achieved through experienced and exposed to a variety of environments/conditions. Like you said, they should be "Professional" in every since of the word from they way they dress, maintain their equipment, interact with other people, skills, etc.

In your professional opinion, once I get to a certain level of experience through the various tech training courses and diving various environments, should I look for a training facility that offers an internship for my DM course? As you are aware, there a lots of CDC's offer DM courses that can be completed in as little as seven days, providing the theory is completed prior to arriving. I guess what i am getting at, is a seven or fourteen day course enough to get the proper training to lay the foundation I need to move on to my IDC?

Again, I sincerely thank you for your counsel as there are no words to begin to describe how much I appreciate it.
Cabub

 

[Jaja]

Hi Cabub

So far, I would say you have received sound advice from everyone.

From experience, the Divemaster course is where you learn the most. Well, you actually learn the most after your IDC when you start teaching but that's another thing. So I would be looking to spend more than 14 days doing this. "Internship" can mean different things to some people but if you mean working alongside more experienced professional as a learning experience then go for it. It's not working for free as you are still learning. Many places teach the DM course with an internship and it takes 4 to 6 weeks. After that time you would need to go to the next level - either find paid work as a DM or do your IDC (preferably the latter).

I would say when choosing a place to do your IDC you should be looking for an IDC or CDC faciltiy so that they will have experienced staff used to teaching pros, and you can stay and take your IDC with them too if you are happy with them.

Your IDC is designed to build on what you learnt during your DM. It teaches you to teach. It will help you if you take with you plenty of experience as a dive pro and that will put you in a better position after your IDC when you start teaching, and learning.

Have you considered Mexico? I guess that its pretty easy and reasonable to travel from the US, and in the Riviera Maya there are a few IDC facilities which also teach Tec and Cave diving. You can also try PADI IDC Dive Instructor courses, Dive theory IDC PADI IE exam revision which spotlights some of the best Course Directors around the world.

Good luck