MikeFerrara:
I don't teach a high priest diving course.
Well someone around here has to be able, I am dying to get that card!
MikeFerrara:
I do however stay in confined water with students until they are comfortable with the basics and can do basic skills while controling their position in the water.
This meets the performance objectives of just about every resort type introduction dive I have seen from any agancy.
MikeFerrara:
Once we get to OW we stay shallow and in a confined are (like over a training platform or similar thing) untill students are weighted, trimmed for the extra exposure protection.
That is the whole idea, a shallow enjoyable experience that shows non divers what diving is all about. Dispelling myths like diving is dangerous, diving is difficult, gurls cant do it, it is deep dark and cold, sharks are evil, you need to breathe differently. etc etc.
How many of the follow up comments to this original post said that "I had a great DSD in "(wherever)" and I am no a dedicated diver.
I know that hte cattle boats dont look pretty, but I think that the more people that poke their heads under water even if it is just once in their life, the better.
Nobody cared about fluffy seals in Newfoundland until they saw pictures of them being skinned on the ice.
If I can put half a million snorklers and divers on a limited patch of reef a year, I think that maybe, somehow, hopefully most of them whill care about is as much as they care about fluffy seals and the forests the Sarawak and Amazon.
Will there be some damage to the reef? Yes. Will there be half a million expert divers/snorklers? NO, do I care? NO.
If it saves the other 3000 km of reef is it worth it?
YES, YES, YES.
Resort divers, you gotta love em; they are the experts of tomorrow.