Instructor flexibility in training.

[Skooter]

Thank you Jim for your common sense, honest opinion. I agree 110%. It is the instructors job to completly train our students, not the training agency. Granted that with the time most folks are willing to spend with the instructor we cannot create seasoned dive veterans, but it sure is our job to completly teach the basics and then some.

 

[SailNaked]

Ill assume some instructors do not teach neutral buoyancy in OW class because it is not a requirement and they are in a hurry or just assume the divers will learn it on their own. Maybe it is because some instructors never really learned it themselves

For a friend of mine it began for her when she went for her OW checkout dive and had to put on a wetsuit for the first time. she "could not" get under so the instructors just kept putting on more weight. so on her first uncontrolled OW dive without an instructor she just assumed she needed 26# to get down.

had the instructor taken the time to make sure she did not have any air in her BC, and that she shook off the air bubbles from her new wetsuit, or better yet required the students to wear a wetsuit in the pool, then maybe she would have known 20 dives earlier that she only needed 12#.

think of all the OW students that are taking their course because they plan to dive for the first time on a beautiful undamaged reef. and the instructors are basically sending ballistic missiles to go blow the reef up. Maybe that is harsh, maybe it is just realistic.

 

[GrimSleeper]

Ill assume some instructors do not teach neutral buoyancy in OW class because it is not a requirement and they are in a hurry or just assume the divers will learn it on their own. Maybe it is because some instructors never really learned it themselves

For a friend of mine it began for her when she went for her OW checkout dive and had to put on a wetsuit for the first time. she "could not" get under so the instructors just kept putting on more weight. so on her first uncontrolled OW dive without an instructor she just assumed she needed 26# to get down.

had the instructor taken the time to make sure she did not have any air in her BC, and that she shook off the air bubbles from her new wetsuit, or better yet required the students to wear a wetsuit in the pool, then maybe she would have known 20 dives earlier that she only needed 12#.

think of all the OW students that are taking their course because they plan to dive for the first time on a beautiful undamaged reef. and the instructors are basically sending ballistic missiles to go blow the reef up. Maybe that is harsh, maybe it is just realistic.

I don't think there's any training agency for whom neutral buoyancy isn't a requirement. What there is, is varying degrees of commitment from instructors.

Working within PADI standards, I don't feel I've done my job on an Open Water course if my students don't spend, at the very LEAST, open water dives 3 and 4 not only neutral throughout the dives but also in good horizontal trim. I also have students diving the least possible amount of weight by that point, too.

On the other hand, there are, apparently, numbers of instructors for whom neutral buoyancy consists of getting somewhere close to 30 seconds of something like a hover out of a student, and for whom proper weighting is the amount of lead required to force a nervous student onto the bottom, plus a bit more for good measure.

Is enough emphasis put on teaching good buoyancy skills and proper weighting during instructor training? I'm not sure it should matter: as an instructor, as an experienced diver, you KNOW what a diver should look like in the water. If you're not producing that, it's not because agency standards don't 'make' you or 'allow' you to: it's because you're either lazy, you're allowing a dive centre to press you for time, or you can't teach.

Grae

 

[Peter Guy]

Walter wrote

PADI's standards require weighting students, but they require it long after it is needed.

What do you mean by this? After just checking the CW performance requirements, I found it is true that on CW 1 there is no "proper weight check." But then, CW 1 is pretty much getting people used to breathing while under water and most of it done in a shallow, safe, place.

BUT, the official PADI performance requirements in CW 2 require a "proper weight check" to make sure the student has the proper amount of weight.

If I recall correctly, doing a "proper weight check" is a requirement of EVERY OW dive. Just because things may not be done correctly doesn't mean they aren't supposed to be done correctly.

And yes, I have a lot to learn about this whole process.

 

[Walter]

What do you mean by this?

Pretty much what you said, you aren't allowed to weight students before you put them underwater on SCUBA. That pretty much eliminates doing anything on SCUBA correctly during CW 1.

 

[Hawkwood]

......

BUT, the official PADI performance requirements in CW 2 require a "proper weight check" to make sure the student has the proper amount of weight.

......

Peter,

During the class I helped with on the weekend, we had 20lbs of weight sitting on the side of the pool at the end of CW2. That was from 7 students. We had a couple that required weighting only to compensate for the tank. Doing the proper weight check took a good chunk of time, but when finished the students had a good appreciation of how to do one.

As an aside, after each student finished with hovering, I had them practice a number of the skills - mask clearing, mask remove and replace, etc. either while hovering or doing thier neutral bouyancy swim. Nobody had problems.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Pretty much what you said, you aren't allowed to weight students before you put them underwater on SCUBA. That pretty much eliminates doing anything on SCUBA correctly during CW 1.

You do realize that the only entity benefitting from your continual statements in this ilk is your infinite ego, don't you?

 

[bjjman]

I would have quite an ego too if I was the caliber instructor that Walter is. I appreciate his statements. I appreciate anybody who stands up for what is right (especially when it goes against the grain). As someone with less than 26 dives, I have quickly learned that there are many poor instructors out there and good ones are few and far between.

I believe all instructors should take a page out of the books of Walter, Thalassamania, JimLap, and other instructors out there that make a conscious effort to retain the integrity of good teaching. Anything short of that is shortchanging the student, any buddies they may dive with, and the environments in which those divers dive.

As for myself, I will be seeking out future instruction from someone like those folks. Man, how I wished I lived nearby one of them!

 

[Steve SDI/TDI HQ]

If my interpretation of the OP's question is correct, Scuba Diving International (SDI) encourages our instructors to add value to the basic open water program (and all others). The core skills for that program include buoyancy control and correct weighting. If an instructor wishes to add a specific task or drill to underscore those core skills, that's fine; in fact encouraged.

I have been involved with the dive industry for a little while and have never heard of an agency discouraging its instructors to be detail oriented and willing to provide the best quality education they possibly can.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I would have quite an ego too if I was the caliber instructor that Walter is. I appreciate his statements.

I appreciate most of his statements