How long to get open water certified?

[loady]

All, When I got open water certified in the 1980s I recall it took AT LEAST four 1-2 hour classroom sessions with books , slides and lectures, four pool dives and four ocean dives. It may have been six of each . I think there was homework and a test each week. There was no crazy long surface swim in full gear. Now What’s the total hours of studying , total number of pool and non pool “open” water dives now to get the open water cert? Is it the same for each agency? Does the amount of time and amount of dives translate to more skills or higher safety?

 

[boulderjohn]

I responded when you posted essentially the same thing in another thread. Here is what I wrote there:

You are describing the least effective mode of teaching and holding it up as an ideal.​

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The next step was home study, where the student when through carefully designed materials and then went to a class where the instructor would go over all that with the students. I started teaching that way, and, ironically, we still spent two 4-hour sessions, about the same total time as you describe. I worked very hard to make sure my students understood, and I would not start the final exam until I was sure all of them would pass. I usually got all students over 90% that way, and I never had a student below 80%. I was proud of that.​

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Then came online learning. Students would arrive with certification that they had passed the online class. We would spend an hour or so going over everything to make sure there were no real problems, then give the final exam. I think I went through about a dozen students that way before I had one miss a single question on the exam.​

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That covers the academic material. As for the performance requirements, almost all agencies are members of the WRSTC, which defines minimum requirements for ow instruction, and those have not changed much at all in decades. About a dozen years ago, PADI issued new standards for the OW class. Those new standards did not remove any of the old ones, and they added about a dozen new requirements. In all likelihood, modern students are expected to do more than was required when you were certified.

 

[Belzelbub]

I was originally certified two separate times in the `90s and have witnessed my daughter's getting certified in the `10s. Lots of variation.

Original OW Cert:
Hard copy book, and tables provided. We were supposed to read on our own.
Classroom sessions to review academics, take written tests. I can't remember exactly how many, but no more than 4.
Pool Dives: 0
OW Dives: 1 (Though even that may not qualify as a dive due to max depth less than 10')

Second OW Cert:
Hard copy book and tables provided. Plan of what to read, by when, and homework for classroom sessions.
Class room sessions: 3 per week over 6 weeks. (1 lecture to review material, 2 smaller groups to work through problems, test material, etc.)
Pool Dives: 12 (2 per week over 6 weeks)
OW Dives: 4

My daughters' OW Certs:
Online training materials and quizzes.
Classroom sessions: 1 (Review and Test, could be more if needed)
Pool Dives: Minimum of 4. Could be more if needed at instructor discretion.
OW Dives: 4. Could be more if needed.

 

[rick00001967]

i can tell you our local shop used to run 6 pool sessions, followed by a couple of hours in the classroom work. then you needed 4 open water dives.

times have changed.

when i was last involved there, they were down to 4 pool sessions and zero classroom time. still 4 open water dives.

i can only assume this was a way for the shop to continue charging the same fee and be able to keep the lights on.

the downside is, divers are less prepared for both water skills and academic knowledge.

i guess the modern way of thinking is that if they were able to complete the online work and pass the final exam, that they must have enough knowledge. the truth is that this is nonsense and i would bet money that 80% of the students could not explain how to plan a dive, use a computer (forget about dive tables), or explain even the basics of most dive theory.

 

[loady]

I responded when you posted essentially the same thing in another thread. Here is what I wrote there:

You are describing the least effective mode of teaching and holding it up as an ideal.​

​

The next step was home study, where the student when through carefully designed materials and then went to a class where the instructor would go over all that with the students. I started teaching that way, and, ironically, we still spent two 4-hour sessions, about the same total time as you describe. I worked very hard to make sure my students understood, and I would not start the final exam until I was sure all of them would pass. I usually got all students over 90% that way, and I never had a student below 80%. I was proud of that.​

​

Then came online learning. Students would arrive with certification that they had passed the online class. We would spend an hour or so going over everything to make sure there were no real problems, then give the final exam. I think I went through about a dozen students that way before I had one miss a single question on the exam.​

​

That covers the academic material. As for the performance requirements, almost all agencies are members of the WRSTC, which defines minimum requirements for ow instruction, and those have not changed much at all in decades. About a dozen years ago, PADI issued new standards for the OW class. Those new standards did not remove any of the old ones, and they added about a dozen new requirements. In all likelihood, modern students are expected to do more than was required when you were certified.

Thanks for replying but that does not answer my question. My scuba text book was about 8x11 , about 200 pages. We were tested on that. I did at least 8 total dives between pool and ocean over 4-6 weeks. I’ve talked to dive students who said that for OW cert took 8-16 hours including online or classroom , tests, 1-2 pool and ocean dives. Is that what the current standard is to get an ow cert from PADI or NAUI? I’m not familiar with non US agencies. Thanks

 

[boulderjohn]

Is that what the current standard is to get an ow cert from PADI or NAUI? I’m not familiar with non US agencies.

The mistake you are making is assuming that the experiences an individual has in a specific class is representative of all classes in an era. Individual instructors are able to do their own thing, for better or for worse. My niece was certified by a NAUI instructor in Okinawa after one 2-hour pool session and one OW dive to 10 feet. That was very much a violation of NAUI standards.

But I did answer your question about pool and OW experiences when I said that standards have not changed much in the last decades, and with PADI they have had more added. We had a thread on this topic a few years ago in which someone posted all the PADI standards from about 30-35 years ago. Of those standards, the only one missing today was one-regulator buddy breathing, which was replaced by alternate air donation. The current standards have about 15 or so requirements that were not in those old standards, including things like fixing a loose cylinder band, releasing weights, deploying a SMB, etc.

In summary, students are now doing the academic materials at home rather than sitting in classroom lectures, and the pool and OW requirements are at least the same as they were when you learned. In some cases, modern students are required to do more.