Divemaster internship where but for koh tao?

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Denise,

I really liked your post for several reasons but I have to give you a bit of a different opinion on some of the points you raise.

Training standards on Koh Tao are not extremely high, but that goes for most of Thailand and many places in the world to be honest. When I started teaching we only did open water courses in 5 days: day 1 CW and theory 1, day 2 CW and theory 2 and 3, day 3 CW and theory 4 and 5, days 4 and 5 the open water dives. And teaching that way you simply have much more time to prepare divers, who will be better divers after course completion than divers who have followed the here very standard 3 day divecourse. I can't bring myself to that and nearly all courses conducted are 4 days BTW, but still, 5 days is better than 4 days.

We have a PADI regional manager living on the island, but I must disappoint you, that does not influence the quality of courses taught, nor does the presence of monthly IE's, the examiners are there to conduct the IE, and that is what they do. They really do not get involved with the operation of the individual companies.

Having said that, violations of standards are not an/the issue (although I recently finished a SD upgrade where a big part of the training on Koh Tao was ommited), but IMO it is much more the total training students are receiving. Many people tend to complete quite a few courses on Koh Tao, giving the finished students a limited experience. On top of that they are quite often trained by people who have followed the same programmes, leading to almost inbreading in the diver education there.
IMO it is much more a lack in variety of diving experience of the students than violations of standards that are the issue. And that is the main reason why I think it is true that DM's from Koh Tao don't have the best reputation.
 
I did my DMT at Lanta Divers in Koh Lanta awhile back. Great shop and great training. I don't know if there's a defined internship program, but my DMT lasted 3 months. Instructors were patient and the course proceeded when they felt you were ready. It was not a zero to hero, you will get your DM cert in 2 weeks as soon as you hit 60 dives sort of program. I also liked their recommendation of working as a DM for a season before going for instructor. But I think the best was that it wasn't a PADI Pro factory. I've been on a few dive boats run by those factories where the majority of the boat passengers are DMT's, the instructors and DM's are freshly minted know-it alls with less than 6 months of dive experience, then a bunch of back packers looking for the cheapest OW1 card, and lastly a few paying recreational divers to be neglected.

On Ko Tao's reputation. I frequently saw people who went to KT for the cheapest/fastest cert possible, then cross over to the Andaman sea wanting to do Hin Daeng / Hin Muang. The best diving in the southern Andaman, and a decent chance to see whale sharks and mantas. They are also submerged pinnacles, with ripping current through the notches and up/down the walls. Every shop I knew would only take these customers to easier dive sites (Koh Haa).

that being said, I did my tec diving course on KT with Master Divers, an all around stellar shop with solid training.
 
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