Becoming an Instructor

[Bob DBF]

Those crappy instructors you talked about turn out crappy students who then become crappy instructors and the circle of craptitude continues

Until there is effective quality control, I do not see an end. It may change when having good instructors is more profitable than having more instructors.


Bob
-------------
Not holding my breath.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

Dude, Sermons are lengthy, like Dumpster Diver's posts. Mine are pretty succinct. If you can't take this mild, mild, mild constructive criticism and insight, what will you do when challenged by your instructor trainer? Do you want to learn, or do you just want a card? If you are going into an IDC with the attitude that you've got nothing further to learn, then it might get a little tense for you. [/understatement] If you don't like what I post, simply ignore it. If it offends you, look inwardly to see why. It's probably not me. If you're simply looking for an atta boy, go get 'em, well I'm fresh out of meaningless cheers for cutting corners. I guess I could try. "Give me an M! Give me an E! Give me a D-I-O-C-R-T-Y! Gooooooo Mediocrity! Woooo!"

I hope you weren't expecting to see my surprised face. I expected you to not see the connection. Why? We approach instruction far, far differently. My most popular class doesn't even have a card associated with it as I see it as being remedial.

I didn't criticize. I merely pointed out that mediocrity attracts more mediocrity. Those crappy instructors you talked about turn out crappy students who then become crappy instructors and the circle of craptitude continues.

LOL.. You should realize that I am all for better instruction and better instructors. Some day, maybe I will take a course and learn how to swim backwards, so far, it hasn't worked on my own.

 

[Michael Guerrero]

Dude, Sermons are lengthy, Mine are pretty succinct.

So....what a great word in the English language.

You have singularly failed to address any of the points put to you. And you are attempting to come off as though what you said wasn't important, as though it is merely a difference of opinion.

I'd like you to make a substantive post regarding the items addressed earlier.

Thanks,
Mike

 

[DevonDiver]

Until there is effective quality control, I do not see an end. It may change when having good instructors is more profitable than having more instructors.... Not holding my breath.

I'd anticipate that the system could be completely turned around in ~2 years.

Change (quality management) need only be introduced at the level of Instructor Examination (IE). A half-day addition to assess fundamental-type diving skill competency. Similar to a 'lite' GUE Fundies format assessment.

Stringent, continual and consistent quality management of large and dispersed global populations of instructor trainers and instructors is hard... practically impossible.

However, it is entirely reasonable to expect that an agency can stringently manage quality assurance in a tiny population of Instructor Examiners.

As Instructor Development Courses (IDC) are generally formatted to (only) prepare candidates to pass the IE tests, any Course Director (CD) wishing to maintain a high pass rate would have to substantially raise their game to include preparatory fundamentals training.

Knowing that both the IDC and IE included a fundamentals-type assessment, there'd be an immediate need to supplement DM training to have a preparatory benefit in respect to diving skills quality.

Pretty soon, even 'fast-track' Pro candidates will be devoting dives to fundamental skill practice...rather than just 'stacking up' aimless low-quality dives to meet logged dive prerequisites.

There'd be a tangible pressure to improve performance, and more so for fast-track Pros. Fast-track would be the harder... very skills intensive... option.

I say a 2-year timescale because that's (I believe?) the approximate average retention for active-status instructors.

2 years is also sufficient timescale to enable existing CDs to raise their game and develop the skills needed to teach/demonstrate refined fundamentals (many don't have that skillset... which is joke). The same applies to instructors routinely teaching DM courses.

It'd also serve to weed out those CDs who couldn't, or wouldn't, make the quality change.

At present there's no commercial penalty for producing unskilled Pros. The commercial penalty created would be via higher failure rates at IE...and tangible under-performance on the trickle-down preparatory syllabus towards IE.

You might not be able to teach old dogs new tricks... but you can make them irrelevant by exposing an inability to adequately prepare their students.

After 2 years, the majority of current instructors will have become inactive. Most active instructors would have passed through DM and IDC training that was re-shaped by a fundamental skills assessment on the IE.

Once the majority of the DM and instructor cadre understood and possessed higher fundamental competencies, there'd be a profound effect on the standard of every diving course... and a wider impact on the 'culture' of diving training.

As it stands, that mainstream training 'culture' is shaped by a system that heeds no credence to the concept of diving skillfullness and barely acknowledges (or understands) the importance of progressively refined fundamental skills.

So... an intelligent and uncompromising 1/2 day addition to the IE format...requiring only an ethical decision by agencies to improve quality... and 2 years later there'd be a profound effect on dive training culture from Pro development down to entry-level training.

 

[DevonDiver]

...the OW student has no clue whether they are paying for quality instruction or not...

That's not strictly true.

There's a vast plethora of guiding information available to any diver who seeks to inform themselves about what constitutes 'quality' dive education.

Unsurprisingly, those resources don't stem from the agencies or schools themselves.

The prospective student need only make a decision look beyond the advertising fluff and seek unbiased, independent guidance before committing substantial finances on training.

Really...just 30 minutes on Google...

So, if we accept that those informational resources DO exist and ARE readily accessible; then prospective diving students either:

1. Do that research and decide to choose on cost factors regardless of what they read.

2. Don't research about quality, but do undertake research on comparative costs and/or convenience.

3. Don't research at all, being content to believe agency and/or dive center quality claims (i.e. advertising) without question or doubt arising.

4. Research by asking recommendations from people who themselves don't understand quality training and have no appreciation of the desired standards of qualification (i.e. other badly trained divers). The blind leading the blind.

5. Don't think to research at all, blithely naive to the likelihood that quality of training and costs will vary markedly from one training provider to another. Typically spur-of-the-moment decisions to enroll on a course and/or walking into the nearest dive centre and sign-up without question.

6. Actively chose not to research at all, because the connection between quality training and dive safety doesn't occur or particularly matter to them. ​

But please.... don't say that people are clueless. They decide to be clueless.

 

[northernone]

Read the whole thread.

Can't figure out the significance of the question you are asking. Is it hypothetical? Anyway related to your own situation? What good does our options serve you in this topic.

If you are an experienced diver with a day job as a teacher I could see how your question might make sense.

If this is the case heres a few ideas:

1) A course director can do a program cheaply if they feel like it, expect fixed costs such as materials. Make friends (by exhibiting the opposite of the attitude you've used on this thread) they can assess your remarkable skills as a teacher and help combine them with your diving experience.

2) Find the worst CD you know of... google worse reviews or perhaps one that has criminal habits or allegations and who needs fast money. Buy a cert.

3) Find a new/failing/unknown cert organization and take their training. (I won't name them)

4) With such a remarkable situation simply start your own organization and issue yourself a cert.

The fastest and cheapest I know of (hypothetically) is a padi CD selling certs in Panama. Alternatively, with less processing and material costs I came across a tdi instructor trainer which similar habits in Mexico but was a little pricier.

Ok, against my better judgement here's my contribution to this thread.

Could you be so kind as to clearly explaining what you are asking so we can reply with less chaos. It hurts my head.

Regards,
Cameron

P.s. yes I did report both people mentioned but they are still active.

 

[northernone]

From what I've seen online (quality source I am sure)

Doing it exactly according to standards:
Padi for fastest, NAUI for cheapest and tiny nearly unheard of organizations for both.

I'd recommend starting your own.

Cameron

 

[Edward3c]

That's not strictly true.

There's a vast plethora of guiding information available to any diver who seeks to inform themselves about what constitutes 'quality' dive education.

Unsurprisingly, those resources don't stem from the agencies or schools themselves.

The prospective student need only make a decision look beyond the advertising fluff and seek unbiased, independent guidance before committing substantial finances on training.

Really...just 30 minutes on Google...

So, if we accept that those informational resources DO exist and ARE readily accessible; then prospective diving students either:

1. Do that research and decide to choose on cost factors regardless of what they read.

2. Don't research about quality, but do undertake research on comparative costs and/or convenience.

3. Don't research at all, being content to believe agency and/or dive center quality claims (i.e. advertising) without question or doubt arising.

4. Research by asking recommendations from people who themselves don't understand quality training and have no appreciation of the desired standards of qualification (i.e. other badly trained divers). The blind leading the blind.

5. Don't think to research at all, blithely naive to the likelihood that quality of training and costs will vary markedly from one training provider to another. Typically spur-of-the-moment decisions to enroll on a course and/or walking into the nearest dive centre and sign-up without question.

6. Actively chose not to research at all, because the connection between quality training and dive safety doesn't occur or particularly matter to them. ​

But please.... don't say that people are clueless. They decide to be clueless.

Don't disagree.

Unfortunately, my anecdotal evidence suggests most potential divers expect to get their diving 'licence' because they paid for it. It happens in clubs as well, I get students complain because I won't sign off a lesson (standard not demonstrated) and argue they'd paid their membership fee and turned up.

Additionally, few people bother to scroll down Google's first page, so the idea of them doing more than 2 minutes or research is laughable.

 

[KevinNM]

The reason I have used GUE is because they pretty much have no bad or unqualified instructors. I've worked with some other instructors, but they were pretty well known people who do very serious dives and have a long record of training.

 

[DevonDiver]

Assume the person is able to execute all skills at the instructor level already and has the requisite knowledge.

This is the root of disagreement.

One cannot simply assume those factors....nor can qualifying agencies.

In truth, nor should the prospective instructor (or his non-instructor advocates)... as they haven't undertaken the training yet and don't know how they'd perform.... beyond hypothetical wishful thinking.

The Instructor Examination (IE) isn't reflected by what you might observe from active instructors. Very, very few instructors teach as per the IE assessed standards. A few teach well above them. Many slide down well below them.

Someone who's not done the IE won't have any clue what is assessed or how... so they're unlikely to grasp their relative capacity against qualified instructors.

It would easy, however, to formulate a flawed self-assessment if you measured yourself against the most deteriorated instructors in the industry.

I'd judge a diver based only on in-water assessment. Nothing more, nothing less.

With decades experience, I learned LONG ago never to assume anything regards competency or an individual's claims to having that.

I'm guessing that others on this thread are also unwilling, or unable, to make such assumptions based on unverified claims.

So... just to clarify the circumstances:

What external diving assessments and verifications has this prospective instructor undertaken previously?
Who provided them?
How did they perform and relative to what standards?