How to Engage Younger People in Diving?

[chillyinCanada]

Once they are actually active divers that is true Marie but we're trying to figure out how to get you g people interested in diving in the first place.

 

[Marie13]

Once they are actually active divers that is true Marie but we're trying to figure out how to get you g people interested in diving in the first place.

Let them take some responsibility for figuring rides out themselves.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

If people choose to live in a place where they don’t need a car or choose to be car free, then that’s their responsibility to get where they want to dive. I have no patience for the sob story. If diving is a priority, they’ll find a way to get there. If it’s not, then they’ll use any excuse.

I’ve had experience locally from multiple young people expecting me to drive miles out of my way to pick them up and drive them home with no outlay on their part at all. They expected a ride to be provided to them for free. I had an entire thread on this. Screw that.

This is a good use of social media - find someone who lives near you and offer cash and maybe lunch/post dive beers, etc., in exchange for the ride.

In my part of the world a car was/is the first thing obtained. After that and the resulting freedom everything else followed. Sounds to me like their priorities are a little screwed up.

 

[DBPacific]

In my part of the world a car was/is the first thing obtained. After that and the resulting freedom everything else followed. Sounds to me like their priorities are a little screwed up.

Make up your minds, do you want us to have cars or do you want us to dive?

I can reach 90% of the places I need to in bike. That's of course being in a college town, when I'm with my parents I'm basically immobilized and need to wait for one of their cars to be available. When I can't reach somewhere, I hitch a ride with someone who's already going there and I try to let them accept payment for gas money or groceries or food. Most won't let me so I leave a standing favor. @Marie13 yeah I don't get why the people you're dealing with don't offer something, but it sounds like they were trying to figure out rides, just being jerks about it.

But if I can reach 90% of where I need to go, why would I try to spend money immediately that I don't yet have on a car when parking permits at my university cost $500 and if it's a game day, I'll still get towed so a game watcher can park there? Yeah I don't have a car, I'm trying to not use as much money as I can so I can afford one later (when I'm not in a college town where parking is absurd) without taking out a loan. The vast majority of students here have cars and never use them because of the parking.

 

[Bob DBF]

In my part of the world a car was/is the first thing obtained.

That’s because out in small towns and out in the country there is no effective public transit, and nothing is centralised. When I lived in San Francisco, I had a car but I didn’t use it unless I was going out of town. It’s a different mindset when you live in a proper city, a vehicle is a lot expense for minimal use.


Bob

 

[Marie13]

Make up your minds, do you want us to have cars or do you want us to dive?

I can reach 90% of the places I need to in bike. That's of course being in a college town, when I'm with my parents I'm basically immobilized and need to wait for one of their cars to be available. When I can't reach somewhere, I hitch a ride with someone who's already going there and I try to let them accept payment for gas money or groceries or food. Most won't let me so I leave a standing favor. @Marie13 yeah I don't get why the people you're dealing with don't offer something, but it sounds like they were trying to figure out rides, just being jerks about it.

But if I can reach 90% of where I need to go, why would I try to spend money immediately that I don't yet have on a car when parking permits at my university cost $500 and if it's a game day, I'll still get towed so a game watcher can park there? Yeah I don't have a car, I'm trying to not use as much money as I can so I can afford one later (when I'm not in a college town where parking is absurd) without taking out a loan. The vast majority of students here have cars and never use them because of the parking.

If you want to dive, it’s your responsibility, not anyone else’s, for you to get to the dive site. Car pool with buddies who do have a car, go in together on a rental, Uber, etc.

If someone chooses to live in an area where they choose to not have a car for any reason, and want to go places they need a car for, that’s their problem. Not anyone else’s.

I make choices and sacrifices in order to do all the diving I want to. If someone can’t be bothered to do that, then I guess they don’t want to dive badly enough.

 

[tursiops]

If people choose to live in a place where they don’t need a car or choose to be car free, then that’s their responsibility to get where they want to dive. I have no patience for the sob story. If diving is a priority, they’ll find a way to get there. If it’s not, then they’ll use any excuse.

I’ve had experience locally from multiple young people expecting me to drive miles out of my way to pick them up and drive them home with no outlay on their part at all. They expected a ride to be provided to them for free. I had an entire thread on this. Screw that.

This is a good use of social media - find someone who lives near you and offer cash and maybe lunch/post dive beers, etc., in exchange for the ride.

Marie, I'm kind of on board with this, once they are hooked on the heroin (diving), but how do you get them hooked?

 

[DBPacific]

If you want to dive, it’s your responsibility, not anyone else’s, for you to get to the dive site. Car pool with buddies who do have a car, go in together on a rental, Uber, etc.

If someone chooses to live in an area where they choose to not have a car for any reason, and want to go places they need a car for, that’s their problem. Not anyone else’s.

I make choices and sacrifices in order to do all the diving I want to. If someone can’t be bothered to do that, then I guess they don’t want to dive badly enough.

...cool I see that you didn't actually listen to anything I said.

I'm done with this thread. Have fun being cranky at youngsters and wondering why they get annoyed at you. Hope to see all of you 'money isn't an issue' and 'kids these days are just lazy and have bad priorities' folks at a dive site...never

 

[Kamaros]

I make choices and sacrifices in order to do all the diving I want to. If someone can’t be bothered to do that, then I guess they don’t want to dive badly enough.

Respectfully, while I totally agree with this about people who have decided that they want to dive, the original purpose of this thread was to figure out ways to convince young people to get involved with diving in the first place, so I don't think that complaining about some entitled jerks you were unfortunate enough to encounter is beneficial to the discussion.

Once I was convinced that I wanted to dive, my desire was enough to make me Uber to San Jose airport and talk a driver into letting me bring a pair of HP100s on the Monterey Airbus shuttle so I could make it down to Monterey in time for my OW checkout dives.

What we're trying to work out is the convincing part. For me, all it took was exposure to the sport during a DSD. That said, I was also a bit of an anomaly for a 23 year old at the time because I worked enough during college to graduate with no debt and an offer for a Silicon Valley tech job, so affordability wasn't much of a barrier for me.

 

[Rickk]

Well, in that case, who is yelling about it on dive boats? smh

I have seen it, if you haven;t then it is just the luck of the draw.