Cost of GUE/DIR training

[iztok]

I am looking but can't find it. What gas mixtures does GUE-F cover?

I am looking at taking advanced nitrox/deco procedures and am looking close to $600 for both classes and books. So I was wondering if it would be better going with GUE-F.

 

[Blow.Fish]

i am looking but can't find it. What gas mixtures does gue-f cover?

ean32

 

[Blackwood]

Ean32

 

[Blow.Fish]

Ean32

Jinx

 

[Scott L]

I am looking but can't find it. What gas mixtures does GUE-F cover?

I am looking at taking advanced nitrox/deco procedures and am looking close to $600 for both classes and books. So I was wondering if it would be better going with GUE-F.

Apples and oranges. Advanced nitrox/deco procedures focuses on extending dives beyond NDL's...

 

[iztok]

Apples and oranges. Advanced nitrox/deco procedures focuses on extending dives beyond NDL's...

I know but wondered if GUE-F covered it or not.

 

[Scott L]

I know but wondered if GUE-F covered it or not.

No...

 

[TSandM]

Allison, I wanted to continue my education with GUE. I believed that I would get a more rigorous and demanding class (and I did) and it would remain consistent with what I had already learned (which it did). It was only after having done the other class that I began to compare the two and ask myself whether the difference in cost was really reasonable.

But honestly, there comes a point in many things where it's hard to justify the increase in cost. A Timex tells time; a Rolex is much more expensive, and tells time; a Patek Philippe watch is insanely expensive, and tells time. Obviously, there are qualities other than timekeeping that cause people to decide to spend the money on the expensive models. I think that's true with GUE classes as well -- you DO get excellent and demanding instruction, no question about it. You're not going to get passed out of a GUE class with the kind of behavior that Cave Diver is bemoaning on the WTF thread. And it's very hard for me to evaluate my other class, because I'd already TAKEN Cave 2, so I had a bunch of information and practice over the topics already. Same with Peter -- he took a MUCH less intense Full Cave class, but he's done all his subsequent diving with highly trained people.

Five years down the line, it may matter a lot more who you dive with, and less who you took your classes from. I don't know.

 

[ScubaFeenD]

Allison, I wanted to continue my education with GUE. I believed that I would get a more rigorous and demanding class (and I did) and it would remain consistent with what I had already learned (which it did). It was only after having done the other class that I began to compare the two and ask myself whether the difference in cost was really reasonable.

But honestly, there comes a point in many things where it's hard to justify the increase in cost. A Timex tells time; a Rolex is much more expensive, and tells time; a Patek Philippe watch is insanely expensive, and tells time. Obviously, there are qualities other than timekeeping that cause people to decide to spend the money on the expensive models. I think that's true with GUE classes as well -- you DO get excellent and demanding instruction, no question about it. You're not going to get passed out of a GUE class with the kind of behavior that Cave Diver is bemoaning on the WTF thread. And it's very hard for me to evaluate my other class, because I'd already TAKEN Cave 2, so I had a bunch of information and practice over the topics already. Same with Peter -- he took a MUCH less intense Full Cave class, but he's done all his subsequent diving with highly trained people.

Five years down the line, it may matter a lot more who you dive with, and less who you took your classes from. I don't know.

I like to think it is a combination of training and buddy selection that helps create a great diver. In my head, without either, you dont really develop your full potential. It is a great point though, because too often people get hung up on formal training as the only way to learn.

I wish there were a way to work out a mentoring program with more instructors so that students can benefit from both skilled mentoring AND formal training.

 

[lamont]

I think its really simpler than that economically. Markets simply tend towards supporting mass-market low profit margin crap like Walmart on one end and high end pricey boutiques on the other. You can find some mom+pop that does good quality for a low price just because they like doing a good job, but it often takes a lot of searching to find that.

And that corresponds to PADI, GUE and the odd really good independent instructor.

And maybe that's why we have younger divers with makeshift sidemounts exploring caves with no real training.

Part of the problem is economy of scale. It's like college textbooks on obscure topics. They cost a fortune in large part because the textbook company cannot make enough money through volume sales to make up for the cost of publishing. The more sales you make, the less you can charge for each individual sale. The fewer sales you make, the more you have to charge to make a profit.

The economics are complex. If you don't have enough students paying a reasonable fee to pay the instructor well enough, you have to charge the students you do have more. If you charge them so much that few people can afford it, you guarantee that you will never have enough students to charge a reasonable fee.

That's the problem with the concept of "you get what you pay for." That same textbook could be sold for a much lower rate if more students were buying it.

In a normal business mode, the idea for most products would be to lower the cost of the product in order to get more people purchasing it and thereby making it profitable at lower costs. Another model is to be content to keep the prices high enough to be profitable in a limited market. That works as long as you don't have any real competition.