Faking Logbook Entries Fact or Fiction?

[MikeFerrara]

I more or less agree. A divemaster "should be some one with a well rounded diving education and experience. Dives for the purpose of practicing skills should count as dives but they need to be put in perspective.
/QUOTE]

I've heard shops are becomming skeptical of DM/instructor cerifications from elsewhere, so that they "test" any incomming job applicants before hiring.

This does happen. I tried several DM's and instructors who came in off the street when I had a shop and it didn't work. Staff was NEVER allowed to be kneeling on the bottom (it just sets a rotten example) and most DM's off the street need to kneel to demo OW skills. I didn't need to see their logbooks, I just needed to see them in the water. I offered every single one who ever wlked in the door a chance to get up to speed but few were interested. they were already expert as far as they were concerned but I didn't agree.

 

[fairybasslet]

Typical rodales.

Shows you how with it you are. Rodales hasn't been the publisher for more than a year. You obviously have some ax to grind. Why don't you try a letter to the editor? I don't blame the author for not coming here to "defend" himself to someone who obviously hasn't bothered to get HIS facts straight.

 

[TheRedHead]

Mike, you've mentioned this knees business many times but I just don't understand it. It has never occured to me to drop to the bottom and get on my knees to flood and clear my mask.

During my last dive, I was wearing a new hood and my mask was leaking. I stopped my descent, took off my mask, pulled down my hood, put my mask back on, cleared it, put the hood over the mask strap (this time) and finished my descent. I have personally not seen any correlation between demoing skills on your knees and actually performing skills in real dives.

I just couldn't respect a DM with 40 local dives to 30 feet.

 

[TheRedHead]

Shows you how with it you are. Rodales hasn't been the publisher for more than a year. You obviously have some ax to grind. Why don't you try a letter to the editor? I don't blame the author for not coming here to "defend" himself to someone who obviously hasn't bothered to get HIS facts straight.

I think the author and publication are just incidental. It's the cirumstances of the story that are interesting.

 

[SadiesMom]

I more or less agree. A divemaster "should be some one with a well rounded diving education and experience. Dives for the purpose of practicing skills should count as dives but they need to be put in perspective.

Well, I made a similar argument during a SI recently - that 60 dives to become a DM or 100 to become an instructor seemed too few IMO. More so if all the dives were at one spot.

Unfortunately, I think this is a product of the modern certifying agencies. It renders the credentials as meaningless in themselves, just like dive count. I've heard shops are becomming skeptical of DM/instructor cerifications from elsewhere, so that they "test" any incomming job applicants before hiring.

I'm going to have to agree with these folks - sorry Rinkopr. While I think that "dive count" in itself is a bit of an arbitrary judge of skill, I also agree with Moonwrasse that the miniscule limit of 40 dives to start DM and 60 to finish is absolutely ludicrously small. And that's a function of experience, not dive count per se. I just don't believe that the VAST majority of divers can possibly experience what a DMC needs to experience in just 60 dives. I didn't even consider *starting* my DM program until I had over 100 dives, although I *could* have - my LDS held a class and I opted to skip it in favor of waiting a year to get more experience diving. I just didn't feel I was ready - even though my *skills* were good (not only did I dive regularly, but I worked on my skills in the pool over the winter). And I am also primarily a DM who assists with classes, rather than one who leads certified divers on dives.

Even working on skills primarily in one certain situation doesn't give you, as Mike Ferrara put it, a "well-rounded diving education and experience." It's not just about "comfort with basic skills" as you put it...it's about know what to do in certain circumstances. It's about having encountered things before and using that experience to work through what to do *this* time based on your past experience. No, you don't have to have dived every kind of water, every depth and every environment...but more than one would be really desirable...

 

[MikeFerrara]

Shows you how with it you are. Rodales hasn't been the publisher for more than a year. You obviously have some ax to grind. Why don't you try a letter to the editor? I don't blame the author for not coming here to "defend" himself to someone who obviously hasn't bothered to get HIS facts straight.

Well golly GEE!.

I don't care who the publisher is. I don't know if it's a poublic or private company and I don't review their anual report if there is one. the only fact I care to keep streight are related to diving and if you think I'm in error someplace please bring it to my attention. They keep sending me the damn thing even though I don't pay for it and don't want it and I keep seeing the same people write the same rediculouse bull ****.

The only ax I have to grind is that writers like that can't get their facts straight even on basics like how the rule of thirds works. LOL

go read that thread why don't you and let me know what you think. I don't recall the title but it was in regards to one of his deep air articles. Then lets talk about facts.m ok?

 

[MikeFerrara]

Mike, you've mentioned this knees business many times but I just don't understand it. It has never occured to me to drop to the bottom and get on my knees to flood and clear my mask.

During my last dive, I was wearing a new hood and my mask was leaking. I stopped my descent, took off my mask, pulled down my hood, put my mask back on, cleared it, put the hood over the mask strap (this time) and finished my descent. I have personally not seen any correlation between demoing skills on your knees and actually performing skills in real dives.

I just couldn't respect a DM with 40 local dives to 30 feet.

Fair question.

Lots of dive trianing is done firmly planted on the bottom. Some instructors even intentionally over weight students so they can get down there and be stable enough to not fall over. I've seen divers get hurt because they couldn't do things midwater that they are able and trained to do on the bottom.

I also have to add that there are instructors who prefer to introduce skills with divers kneeling but go on and finish with them able to do things midwater. That's a matter of prefernce and what works, works. I don't feel divers who can't function midwater should be certified but training standards allow that to happen. Some shops and instructors use that as a loop hole to shorten training and do certify students who not only need the bottom but haven't demonbstrated that they can spend the majority of a dive off of it.

It's become something of a pet peev with me even though I do recognize that there are instructor who do a good job dispite what the agency requires. There are just as many instructors who are new divers themselves (sort of fits the subject of the thread) who haven't yet gotten off the bottom themselves and don't know the difference.

I do not mean to paint all instructors with the same brush and there are many fine people and talented divers/teachers teaching diving. I just think they should get more help from the agencies that they teach through.

 

[Rinkopr]

Are you in a DM training program?

I am not yet, and the instructor I will be working with says he will not start my training until I have 40 dives logged. At that time he will start my Dm training and I can order the books necessary. Until that time I attend all of his classes and participate in discussions in both class and post diving. I am working now to learn the curriculum of OW, and to gain a better understanding of the typical mistakes and questions students have. When diving, I continue to work with basic skills so they become automatic rather than a thought process. I am also trying different equipment so I have the ability to talk about options to students that are looking for differences in equipment (ie back inflation vs jacket vs bpw).
The LDS does not have a DM and sorely needs one to assist with in-store sales and promotion of classes. The most we have in any one class is 6 and that is a good number with an instructor only. The classes they run are 2 consecutive weekends and already I am using what knowledge I have to help students purchase their required equipment and setup properly.
I again will stress that I feel there should be 2 classifications of DMs. One that work with instructors, and one that assist boat captians and shops with trips. Having taken several classes I have seen Dms that were GREAT on a boat, but in class, pool, and OW class dives made divers feel insignificant or belittled. There were also other occasions that a DM that worked with a class went with us on a boat dive, and looked more uncomfortable than the other less experienced divers.
I am an instructor in my paying life, and teach a technical trade, both classroom and field experience. Teaching is what I do, although I consider it sharing when it is as much fun as diving. It's not that I don't want hundreds of dives with different experiences, but I would hate to have a DM in SO California that did all of his dives in southern Fl.
The LS had one person working toward his DM status when he took a couple of people out to the Keys, and rented NITROX filled tanks for these two "7 dive count OW Certified Divers". His rational was they would be with him and he could make sure they followed the EAN charts. I will note this guy had 175 dives in all kinds of areas but yet just didn't "Get It".

Education is a continuous process. The second we think we know it all we will fail.

 

[fairybasslet]

**.

The only ax I have to grind is that writers like that can't get their facts straight e

Like you writing in this thread? If you don't want the mag, call them and tell them. I'm sure they would be happy to stop sending to you. :05:

 

[MikeFerrara]

Rinkopr,

Most agencies require way less than 40 dives to start DM training so it sounds like the instructor is requiring more. My suggestion is to make time to get out and do some fun diving aside from anything training related in as many different environments and activities as you can. That suggestion is as much for your sake as the sake of the students you'll be working with. I feel I was a DM before I should have been and I was an instructor before I should have been. At the time I thought I was good and I always followed standards. Nobody got hurt but looking back that's nothing short of a miracle and I take ZERO credit for it. Looking back and knowing what I know now, there were so many times that it came so close and I didn't even recognize it at the time. As a pro teacher, you know that even though we have the teachers addition with the answers in the back that part of our real value is the insight we can give students from our own real life experience that you can't find in any book.

Well, there's my 2 1/2 cents and of course good luck.