NASE! Your thoughts and opinions please

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

"Teach Real-World Diving: No mandatory snorkels. No required skills that put you and your students at risk. And no out-of-date procedures that should have been abandoned in the 1970s."

Join NASE

NASE Doesn’t Offer a Remedial Mask Clearing Course, Either… The number one complaint among dive operators is that new divers can’t control buoyancy. And no wonder! The typical scuba student spends up to 90 percent of his time in the water standing, sitting or kneeling on the bottom. How can he ever learn buoyancy control doing that? The situation is so bad some agencies offer remedial buoyancy control courses to try to help new divers fix problems that never should have been allowed to happen in the first place. That’s just plain wrong. NASE doesn’t offer a remedial buoyancy control course any more than we offer a remedial regulator recovery or mask clearing course. To us, buoyancy control is not a “skill” to be demonstrated by doing fin pivots in open water. Controlling buoyancy is at the heart of everything we teach, right from the start. Find out how easily you can fix one of the biggest problems in diver training. Visit www.ScubaNASE.com/buoyancy. And be sure to visit us at DEMA, booth 1583, for a special opportunity for dive professionals

https://www.naseworldwide.org/skins/userfiles/file/JoinNASE Package(1).pdf

I am reading the rest of their standards and it seems like they are a very well thought out agency.

http://www.naseworldwide.org/skins/userfiles/file/Standards&Procedures_2011_ver101130.pdf

 

[The Chairman]

I've had a student that went from Open Water to Advanced under me and then went to take a cavern course. His trim and buoyancy were so spot on that the instructor began intro to cave, thinking the "cavern" request was a typo. While I can take a bit of credit, the process of "no kneel" instruction is the real key. That can be done with most any agency, but it's a way of life at NASE. Just after mask clearing, trim and buoyancy are the first two skills of the class. Everything is built on that foundation. Teaching mask clearing is not done on Scuba, so those are essentially the first two skills learned on Scuba. The best part is that I don't have bolters any more because they are so comfortable. They learn the rest of the skills just how they'll use them while horizontal. It's awesome and compliments are common. Twice I've been asked why I'm teaching a cavern class, first in a pool, and then while they were wearing snorkels. If students show an interest in snorkelling, I'm happy to teach them. It's why the comment on how NASE hates snorkels is so ridiculous to me. I think it's the frog kick, as I push that on every student. No, not required, but if they emulate me, then they'll be frog kicking. Be the example you want your students to be like. They'll copy both good and bad habits.

 

[BoltSnap]

Wait, you think they've actually done this? Wow. That's silly too. I'm guessing you've never taught for them.

I don't comment on agencies I've never taught for because I don't want to be the one spreading silly crap about them. It's not that I don't have an opinion about them, but as a professional instructor, I will let those who have worked with them comment on what they do, their attitudes and how they do it. I rarely comment on NAUI any more since I left them years ago. There's no rule on ScubaBoard about this: it's just my own ethics.

I was referring to your own tasteless and silly example:

Yeah, they've been known to protest snorkel manufacturers at DEMA and burn their booths down. Yeah, that's as silly as saying they have any hostility towards snorkels.

Now for the part concerning knowing NASE, I have actually gone through their entire crossover program including their eLearning lessons for the crossover, Openwater and Advanced openwater in their entirety and have passed the crossover program. I have studied their standards and requirements very carefully and in depth as I do with ALL other agencies I have crossed over to or trained with as in the case with NAUI and few other agencies. I have asked questions, communicated with them over emails and other platforms. I have researched them and talked to others who were NASE instructors. I have done my homework to the nth degree. At the end I have decided that NASE didn't offer me any added value in terms of quality, level of standards, teaching material (including eLearning) beyond what NAUI offered me at that time. NAUI came out miles ahead in all aspects, not just against NASE but also compared with many of the major brands including the ones that tout their "eLearning" systems and teaching material as "state of the art" or their actual teaching standards. NAUI was and is best value with highest standards out there. After months of investigation of NASE, I came to the conclusion that NASE was created primarily for the owners of NASE to offer "dive instructor" cards to their commercial diving program students, not a whole lot more. I am not saying that they are "bad," I am simply stating that they don't come even close to what NAUI has to offer in terms of quality of material, standards and value or anything else.

This is MY experience with them after detailed and extensive study and comparison and researching references. I am a detailed type of an engineer who pays attention to quality in diver education. I do the same type of evaluations for NAUI all of the time. I even send critiques and feedback to NAUI related to various issues and material that NAUI makes. NAUI fails usually in marketing and letting the world knows about what great value and high quality it has when compared with the marketing and "hoopla" other agencies make. NAUI, however, is improving a great deal and is embarking on an aggressive marketing plans. NAUI is also revamping ALL of its diver training programs, recreational and technical, including creating a totally new eLearning platform that is truly the best I have seen in the business (yes, I have gone through many other eLearning programs with several other agencies recently to compare). NAUI is publishing new textbooks to support its programs that are even better than the previous great products. The new support material for NAUI's version of the Advanced Openwater Scuba Diver program is miles ahead of the previous versions and certainly better than the competition. It is kick ass program. The NAUI Nitrox program including the textbook, eLearning, course standards is the highest level in the industry, no one else has it. Same thing for Master Diver -CERTIFICATION- course.

There is no "silliness" here, it is professional and thorough study and constant evaluation and comparison on my part to assure that I am getting the best value with the best quality and highest standards I am also delivering to my students.

P.S. I wish that you respect the opinions and experience of other instructors here in this board especially the ones that have been diving and teaching for several decades please and not call them silly or belittling their work and their opinions.

 

[The Chairman]

P.S. I wish that you respect the opinions and experience of other instructors here in this board especially the ones that have been diving and teaching for several decades please and not call them silly or belittling their work and their opinions.

I don't like agency bashing. Saying that NASE is hostile towards snorkels is just that... and it is silly. Some instructors love the fact that they and their students don't have to wear a snorkel, but that has nothing to do with the agency stance towards snorkels. But somehow you think that it's OK to bash an agency and not have their instructors call you on it? That's just BS and not how a forum works.

Choosing NASE is not an attempt to 'belittle your work or opinions". I'm glad you found a home with NAUI. They have a lot of great qualities, so have fun with them. While I used to teach exclusively NAUI for years, I still don't feel I have the right to disparage them publically over why I left. Why? Ethics. You simply have different ethics than I have. You'll never, ever find me publically disparaging another agency or instructor. It's just not professional.

NASE protocols were developed by a NAUI Course Director who left for almost the same reasons as I did. As I posted before, it's important for every instructor to choose the agency that is right for them. He cut out dangerous and ineffective 'skills' like the CESA and then pared away non-essential skills like reg/snorkel switching. The focus has been on producing neutrally buoyant divers who have great trim.

 

[kelemvor]

I was reading their standards and it seemed like the agency was directed towards a more serious diver. No mandatory snorkels! YAAY! Courses require minimum bottom time instead of minimum number of dives. Skills must be performed effortlessly and repeatedly etc. Any NASE students or instructors on here?

I did cave and Tec45 with NASE. Instructor was the late Reggie Ross. It's also worth getting crossover cards for other agencies if you're doing cave. Assuming your instructor is with those others as some sites require a specific card. The crossovers aren't very expensive.

I'm not talking about instructor crossover cards, but the concept is similar. Still have to make sure you meet the criteria for the other agencies, but if your instructor is decent your skills will carry over simply enough.

The NASE website (although laughably insecure) is functional.

 

[Manatee Diver]

I did cave and Tec45 with NASE. Instructor was the late Reggie Ross. It's also worth getting crossover cards for other agencies if you're doing cave. Assuming your instructor is with those others as some sites require a specific card. The crossovers aren't very expensive.

Reggie was the only one at Cavediving.com that maintained NASE instructor creds. Apparently Harry dropped them, not sure if Chris was ever a NASE instructor.

 

[The Chairman]

Reggie was the only one at Cavediving.com that maintained NASE instructor creds. Apparently Harry dropped them, not sure if Chris was ever a NASE instructor.

I miss ol Reg.