Have training standards "slipped"?

[MikeFerrara]

(Mike, do you find any current agency OW and AOW instruction to your liking?)

Well, I know quite a few instructors who, IMO, teach excellent classes. In most cases, though, we couldn't credit the agency.

From what I can tell, though, all/most of the mainstream agencies are missing the same elements that I think are essential so the general answer would have to be "no". What I think is missing is all pretty straight forward and pretty much has to do with the student being taught to function midwater (that's what diving is right?) and being required to do so in an actual diving context. Control of position and movement in the water clumn is the core skill that everything else needs to be built on rather than kneeling. Nothing real tricky and nothing that I really think should be very contraversial.

I'm not familiar with the standards of every agency, of course, but I was an IANTD instructor and there are a lot of things about their standards that I like...not everything but a lot. For one, the student evaluation that is required to be filled out for every dive. They make it clear that the student is to demonstrate good technique during each dive...real diving things. In order to "pass the course" in the minimum required number of dives the student has to achieve a certain average score. If not they have to do a couple of extra dives and still obtain a specified score. The point is that their actual diving is to be evaluated. The problem is that the scoring is subjective and, in practice, I don't think IANTD instructors are doing anything that everyone else isn't doing.

I read the GUE standards for their OW course on their web site and I think it's a giant step in the right direction although, I don't like the disappearing ink they use on their certification cards.

AOW? As long as I see AOW students sitting in the bottom messing with combination locks at 60+ ft before they ever have to demonstrate that they can dive well shallow or planting their butts on training platformes to tie the knots for the S&R dive or bouncing through their navigation course while the instructor sits on shore or the boat watching their bubble trail, I'm afraid that I'm going to be of the opinion that the AOW course is a completely flawed concept. It's just kneeling and bouncing in a variety of different environments and the students still aren't required to dive.

Remember that commercial..."Where's the beef?" Well, where is the diving? My attitude toward the dive insustry is about like my attitude toward fast food. The fact that McDonalds has sold 10 trillion burgers doesn't mean that they were good burgers or that McDonalds is getting any better at making them. They may be expert at something but it isn't making good food. That's not even what they're trying to do.

The mainstream dive certification agencies may be expert at something but diving, demonstrably, isn't it and, clearly, that isn't what they are trying to be.

 

[captain]

The bungied 2nd (octo) has been around a lot longer than GUE.

How true but not necessarly the octo. Most of the first generation of single hose regulators and some of the old two hose regulators came from the factory with a neck strap built into the mouthpiece to keep it place if it slipped out of your mouth. The training agencies at the time considered it a hazard to have it strapped around your neck in case an emergency required that the tank and regulator be ditched so everyone removed them. This was pre BC and octo days.

 

[Walter]

They were all ex-military, and teaching as they had been taught - lots of fitness, "this is THE way it's done", all learn by doing and almost no theory. The 100 yard swim, the 20 minute tread water, and maybe some push-ups were the norm for the first class. Woment need not apply.

As far as I'm aware, pushups were never in agency standards. Yes, some instructors required them as well as running in full gear along the beach, but that has nothing to do with standards.

As for women, when the first national certification agency, YMCA, held it's first Instructor Institute, certifying instructors in 1959, women were in that first group certified. Women have been part of diving from the beginning.

So, have standards "slipped"?

No. They have not slipped. They have been gutted by some agencies.

Can you learn everything in 2 days?

Depends on what you mean by everything. Everything required by some agencies? Yes. Everything necessary to dive safely? Not even close.

Double drowning while attempting to buddy breathe was one of the most prevalent causes of diving deaths in the early years.

What makes you think this is the case?

Most new people in the sport don't want to be UDT qualified

Unless you have a military mission, you would have no reason to be UDT qualified. OTOH, I've never heard of an actual recreational class that contains training in explosives. Joe, I respect you, but statements like this are irresponsible and misleading.

Is that not the norm?

It is not.

Are the standards different with the different agencies (I mean, regarding the basic requirements)?

There are big differences from one agency to another. I noticed you were certified through NAUI. NAUI encourages its instructors to add requirements.

The "standards have slipped" arguement is no different than "I walked three miles in the snow to school" arguement.

On your next trip to Florida, drop by my house, I'll show you PADI standards from 1972 and 1977. Compare them to those of today, then tell me there is no difference.

Yeah, the standards have all gone to pot. We are no longer allowed to crawl on the reef.

Depends on which standards. Some standards today actually do allow you to crawl on the reef. At least one agency never requires their instructors to evaluate underwater swimming in open water at all.

We surely don't get to learn about underwater combat or how to set underwater charges. Gone is the neo-Seal training exercizes that were designed to weed out the timid diver.

Those were never part of standards. You know it, I know it. Implying they were is misleading.

Now diving has been opened up to just about EVERYONE. The gear has gotten easier to use, more reliable and lighter as well. Gone is that Macho image that we worked SO HARD to foist on the unsuspecting public. Hey, even grandmas are getting certified WITH their grand children! I have to say that I LOVE IT!

That's good, but it's even easier when students have more time to break things down into smaller steps. It's even easier when students are allowed to build their confidence through the use of learning skills. Yes, some poor instructors have used skills to harrass students, but lots of those skills are still in everyone's standards. It's not the skills that are harrassment, it's how they are taught.

Dude, neutral bouyancy was not taught in the 70s

When you don't have a BC, neutral buoyancy is critical. Neutral bouyancy is not usually taught well today. Instead of weighting themselves properly, putting a little air in their BCs or inhaling a little more deeply, I see lots of divers swimming up with their hands to stay off the bottom.

I'm still confused on the whole buddy-breathing to the surface thing. Is that not common practice? That was one of my least favorite exercises, but we did do it. That and the unconcious diver, but once I got the hang of the unconcious diver, I was OK with it. Never liked the buddy-breathing, though. Do most instructors not do this?

Most agencies have made it optional. Too many people are afraid of HIV. Rescues are taught by YMCA, NAUI and not very many (if any) others in the entry level class.

I just kinda thought all the agencies did pretty much the same things.

Most folks assume the way they were taught is the way everyone is taught. It isn't that way.

My question for those certified in the dark ages (as one poster put it, no offense) is whether you feel you were an independent diver when you came out of your certification class? After my OW class, I definitely wasn't and didn't feel qualified to plan a dive for me and a buddy. For those that got certified 20 years before I did, coming out of that class, did you feel comfortable (and actually, do you think you were capable of) planning a dive for only you and your buddy? (That's what I'd call an independent diver.)

Yes. There are some classes today that acomplish exactly this.

Today's divers are so much more careful than that sea hunt era.

What makes you think so?

You can claim you are the super instructor all you want, but all I see is elitism.

Then you aren't looking. He's never claimed to be "super instructor" and the methods he uses actually makes learning to dive easier, not harder, that is not "elitism."

the problem is that 50% of all instructors out there are below average....

The problem is that average mark is set pretty low.

I am actually allowed to disagree with you, and even to say that some of your protocols are dangerous.

Yes, you are, but saying he claims to be super instructor, when he's never said anything of the kind is a tad beyond a simple disagreement and goes into the area of a personal attack.

not every diver needs to be Mike Hunt (go look that one up, kiddies!)

Sorry, but that's merely the punch line from a bad practical joke. I believe you meant Mike Nelson.

I believe Walter produced a rather comprehensive skills comparison some time ago. Last year? Year before.

About 10 years ago, last updated about 5 years ago. It is not posted on this site. I'll send it to those interested, but keep in mind it is out of date, some agencies frequently change their standards. It only included YMCA, NAUI & PADI.

Seems scary without using dive tables, atleast understanding them. 2 days seems WAY too short for a OW course.

How far did you walk to school?

If standards were slipping so badly, fatality rates in recreational scuba would be rising not falling, as they have steadily for the last 20 years or so.

What makes you think they aren't rising? We have no reall numbers to tell us one way or the other.

Here you go Nichole:

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?p=2599913

I'm proud of that, but it's not what she wanted.

The message that's intended is this: "Back when *I* took the course, it was so much harder so *I* must be SO much smarter than these schmucks today."

Actually, my class was much, much easier than most available today. There are still some easy, comprehensive classes available, but you really gotta look hard for them, but they will probably cost more and they will take more time, but they are worth it because they are so much easier and you are a much better diver as a result.

They don't teach buddy breathing because it's DANGEROUS.

Is that why they allow it as an optional skill? It is not dangerous when it's taught. It is dangerous when it's not taught or taught poorly.

Here's something I would like to see changed in training: the regulator sweep. Why not go for the alternate FIRST.

Some instructors do teach it that way. Standards, however, don't require it in any agency of which I'm aware.

OK NOW I AM MAD.

I just got off another thread where divers were complaining about the cost of a dive course. $550 and they felt they had been ripped off. Others were talking of courses for less than $200.

COME ON PEOPLE..

If dive instructors are valued by their clients at burger flipper wage, then you cant expect them to give Ritz Carlton service, do the math.

Yet another problem with dive instruction.

 

[GrumpyOldGuy]

To the original question - have the standards slipped. In my case I did NASDS in 1977 (OW and advanced classes)and then redoing my OW in 2007 with my sons (my NASDS card went AWOL and NASDS lost their records due to a warehouse fire). Now granted my memory is a little foggy on 1977, but it was not all that different. Yes, we did real buddy breathing as octo's were new and not universal and a few other differences. We drilled the tables to death (no computers), blah, blah, blah....

The instructor makes the biggest difference by far, good or bad. In both cases, mine wanted to pass everyone and eventually did (profit motive!). I think they were reasonably good, but in my last class that passes some students who really needed some more training.

The big difference were the students. Then pretty much everone were motivated, young, fit to some extent and ready for adventure. Yes we even had a gal. Now there is a mix of very young, sometimes imature (age independent) and older folks, of which some are just not motivated. Some of these people just don't take the class seriously, skipped homework, never practiced and not only departed without the needed knowedge and experience, but also tended to drag the rest of the class down. Some are not fit to dive except in a pool or deal calm water. One was diabetic and passed out on the surface (she is fine now).

IMO, The advice to a new diver is not to worry so much about the agency or instructors standards. I would set your own personal standards. Then practice diving in safe shallow water until you are 100% confident that you (and your buddy) can meet all your own standards.

 

[Thalassamania]

How true but not necessarly the octo. Most of the first generation of single hose regulators and some of the old two hose regulators came from the factory with a neck strap built into the mouthpiece to keep it place if it slipped out of your mouth. The training agencies at the time considered it a hazard to have it strapped around your neck in case an emergency required that the tank and regulator be ditched so everyone removed them. This was pre BC and octo days.

There was also a story that may or may not have been true about someone diving with such a strap when another diver snatched the regulator out of their mouth and tried to use it. The strap supposedly stretched and then snapped back breaking the diver's jaw.

At least that was what we were told when they cut the neckstraps off all of our DACOR 300s.

 

[Walter]

IMO, The advice to a new diver is not to worry so much about the agency or instructors standards. I would set your own personal standards. Then practice diving in safe shallow water until you are 100% confident that you (and your buddy) can meet all your own standards.

So how do they learn skills left out of their class? How do they even know what skills were left out? You don't know what you don't know.

 

[SparticleBrane]

I'd say they slipped...and fell...
Like that old commercial: "Help, I'm falling and I can't get up!"

 

[J.R.]

First of all... a major tip of the flipper to Walter's rather definative post... I pretty much think he hit it all...

I do have one ponderance though... and it's just my own perception... On another thread in another lifetime somebody asked how we got up and down in the water "back in the day" when we didn't have power inflating BC's to adjust bouyancy. The universal answer from those of us who dove "in the day" (3 miles of snow... up hill... worst blizzard... AND IN THE DARK!!!)... was, "We swam."

I've got this nagging suspicion that, besides ecconomic pressures to 'grow the sport'... there is also a certain 'dependancy on technology' issue at play... and this isn't just a phenomenon related to diving.

Take winter driving... (for those of us who HAVE winter). "Back in the day" you were taught how to 'pump brakes', turn into the skid, etc., etc. NOWDAYS... you learn that you press and hold the brake petal (because of anti-locks) and hold the wheel straight. Different technology... different skills. If you ONLY learn how to drive according to the state of the art technology today it doesn't really prepare you for a condition where that technology isn't available to you for one reason or another... including equipment failure.

Yet... there's also a portion of me that sez', "That's all fine and good until the technology fails you... then if you don't have the fundies... you're SOL..."

I'm kinda' becoming of the opinion that there is an underlying philosophy out there that IF you have the proper technology and IF you have it serviced annually like they recommend and IF you stay within the recommended operating perameters associated with whatever training level you have you'll be 'sufficiently safe'...

... does this match up to my own beliefs? Nope... I would concur with Walter, SparticleBrane and others who don't seem overly enamored with today's level of training. But... the arguement can also be made that NO level of training can possibly prepare you for every possible condition or situation. Even "in the day" training prepared you the best they knew how... and then it was, "OK... now go dive and polish your skills... If you survive it long enough... you might become a diver."

Good thing? Bad thing? ... I'm not sure. But I *have* always held to the philosophy that the more tools you have in your tool chest the better off you are... and if you actually PRACTICE with those tools on a regular basis... you're better off yet.

 

[Adobo]

This topic has been covered on numerous occasions in a variety of ways.

It seems to me that regardless of whether the standards have slipped or not, it is clear that doing anything more than a 30 foot reef dive right out of open water certification is an adventure at best. And attempting to change the standards/training regimen from the big agencies through threads like this is an exercise in futility.

I wonder if the scubaboard community would be better served by coming up with a set of guidelines that we as a community feel is appropriate. As an example, out of open water, max depth should be no more than 50 feet (regardless of what your agency says). And then maybe a list of instructors by region that describes what each instructor teaches that can get newbs (like me) from "accident waiting to happen" level to the "ready for the ocean" level.

23 pages of the same discussion about how sucky things are today isn't really helping resolve this particular issue.

 

[J.R.]

It seems to me that regardless of whether the standards have slipped or not, it is clear that doing anything more than a 30 foot reef dive right out of open water certification is an adventure at best. And attempting to change the standards/training regimen from the big agencies through threads like this is an exercise in futility.

Somebody once asked me "... why do you have to fight city hall?"... My answer, "... because I fear what would happen if everybody stopped."

These threads might NOT change the big agencies... but they DO make people think... and thinking is never a bad thing.