Question NAUI leaves WRSTC?

[NothingClever]

again, and I am not sure how to say it more clearly, NAUI was a founding member.

The RSTC was set up by the for-profit training agencies for the for-profit training agencies. NAUI and YMCA were conspicuous by their absence from the start.

@lowwall - can you cite your historical source?

@cerich was on the BOD at one point.

 

[lowwall]

@lowwall - can you cite your historical source?

@cerich was on the BOD at one point.

Here's one source. This is what NAUI posted when they joined in 2017.

NAUI Becomes a Member of RSTC - NAUI Worldwide

This past August, NAUI Worldwide was informed that the Recreational Scuba Training Council (RSTC) Board of Directors voted unanimously to accept its membership application.

www.naui.org

"NAUI was one of five training agencies that initially participated in discussions in 1985 that led to the formation of the RSTC but ultimately declined membership at that time due to other organizational and operational priorities. However, even without formal membership, NAUI remained informed and engaged through its members who served on the council in various capacities."

We also have this from IDEA at Our Story | America's First Scuba Agency | IDEA Scuba

"Founding Members of the RSTC

IDEA – International Diving Educators Association PADI – Professional Association of Diving Instructors PDIC – Professional Diving Instructors Corporation NASDS- National Association of Scuba Diving Schools SSI – Scuba Schools International"

 

[NothingClever]

Looks like dems da facts!

 

[cerich]

@lowwall - can you cite your historical source?

@cerich was on the BOD at one point.

of both NAUI and RSTC

Anyhow, I wasn't there in early days and was there when NAUI did join RSCT in 2017.

I think I may have been wrong regards NAUI being founding member, like I said, I know NAUI Japan was in RSTC Japan, and I guess NAUI was in the early discussions and backed out at some point? (Thanks @lowwall for you posting that press release)

 

[cerich]

Here's one source. This is what NAUI posted when they joined in 2017.

NAUI Becomes a Member of RSTC - NAUI Worldwide

This past August, NAUI Worldwide was informed that the Recreational Scuba Training Council (RSTC) Board of Directors voted unanimously to accept its membership application.

www.naui.org

"NAUI was one of five training agencies that initially participated in discussions in 1985 that led to the formation of the RSTC but ultimately declined membership at that time due to other organizational and operational priorities. However, even without formal membership, NAUI remained informed and engaged through its members who served on the council in various capacities."

We also have this from IDEA at Our Story | America's First Scuba Agency | IDEA Scuba

"Founding Members of the RSTC

IDEA – International Diving Educators Association PADI – Professional Association of Diving Instructors PDIC – Professional Diving Instructors Corporation NASDS- National Association of Scuba Diving Schools SSI – Scuba Schools International"

I recalled i have a copy of the original articles of incorporation of the RSTC, that list them

NASDS (John Gaffney), PADI (Al Hornsby), PDIC (Doris Murphy), IDEA (Dave Scoggins) in 1987, not 97 that I believe I saw someone post elsewhere in this thread

 

[boulderjohn]

"NAUI was one of five training agencies that initially participated in discussions in 1985 that led to the formation of the RSTC but ultimately declined membership at that time due to other organizational and operational priorities. However, even without formal membership, NAUI remained informed and engaged through its members who served on the council in various capacities

I found this portion of the article most interesting.

I have been on ScubaBoard for more than 20 years, and I recall many discussions on the this topic. As I recall, people who pointed out that NAUI was not a member of the RSTC said that it was because they fundamentally disagreed with the RSTC and wanted nothing to do with them. This effectively contradicts that common belief.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I found this portion of the article most interesting.

I have been on ScubaBoard for more than 20 years, and I recall many discussions on the this topic. As I recall, people who pointed out that NAUI was not a member of the RSTC said that it was because they fundamentally disagreed with the RSTC and wanted nothing to do with them. This effectively contradicts that common belief.

I doubt we'll ever know the real truth.
There seems to purposely be a severe lack of transparency and a lot of stonewalling and secrecy.
Not that it really matters, it's only diving and a very infinitesimally small part of the activity sport world.
If they want to have their secret club with confidentiality clauses and secrets dying with them, so be it. What is so damning that they have to have confidentiality clauses? WTH!
As a consumer that doesn't give me lot of confidence that any if this is functional with any integrity.
I don't think any of this was ever intended to be open knowledge provided to the general diving public. I suppose we're just supposed to buy education as it's served to us and not question it. Whatever goes on in the back room is none of our business? Is that so...
That's not how my brain works, I like to know what's in the food I eat (so to speak) but maybe everyone else is different.
I still want to know what happened with NAUI then and now.

 

[lowwall]

I found this portion of the article most interesting.

""NAUI was one of five training agencies that initially participated in discussions in 1985 that led to the formation of the RSTC but ultimately declined membership at that time due to other organizational and operational priorities. However, even without formal membership, NAUI remained informed and engaged through its members who served on the council in various capacities "

I have been on ScubaBoard for more than 20 years, and I recall many discussions on the this topic. As I recall, people who pointed out that NAUI was not a member of the RSTC said that it was because they fundamentally disagreed with the RSTC and wanted nothing to do with them. This effectively contradicts that common belief.

I think they did fundamentally disagree with the direction the RSTC's founding group of members wanted to go which is why they pulled out. I came across a mention that NAUI actually started (or just tried to start?) an alternative to the RSTC a few years later with a handful of likeminded agencies, but it never went anywhere. I need to see if I can track that down.

 

[boulderjohn]

I have long had the feeling that a lot of the first decades of instruction involved a wide variety of instructional programs and techniques, and I feel it is very likely that individual instructors probably fought hard against any kind of standardization. I believe that in part because for a number of years my job was to teach innovative instructional techniques to high school teachers, and many of the those teachers made it damned clear that nobody was going to tell them how to teach.

Here are some tidbits from the world of scuba.

• One of the origins of instruction was the Scripps Institute in California, which in the early 1950s created an instructional program out of nothing in response to the death of a scuba diver. Other people began to teach scuba elsewhere, creating their own programs from their own ideas. Many had learned in the navy.
• Los Angeles County created a program based on the Scripps model, sending Al Tillman to Scripps to learn out how they did it.
• Tillman and others then tried to create a national program, which eventually became NAUI.
• According to the History of NAUI written by NAUI founders Al Tillman, et. al., in the seminal meeting in Houston , they brought in instructors from across the land, and these instructors brought their own ideas and methods. For example, Tillman wrote that the Los Angeles people were surprised to see some of them harassing students by ripping off masks, turning off air, etc. They themselves did not approve, and felt it was done more for the amusement of the instructor than the education of the student.
• NAUI was then formed basically on the Scripps/Los Angeles model, but individual instructors were allowed to add to it as they saw fit. Students from that era may have gotten very different instruction, depending upon the instructor. You may think ripping off masks was how all scuba was once taught, but it wasn't.
• The YMCA had a similar issue, one that eventually led to the end of the program. Individual YMCA's fiercely defended the way they did things, and the organization did not have the central power to make things different.
• When I started tech training, the instruction was technically TDI, but the instructor flat out said that he would ignore the TDI standards and teach according to the GUE model. We students had no idea what we had to do to complete any of the courses--we just had to wait until the instructor announced that we had completed Advanced Nitrox, Decompression Procedures, etc. I was pissed, but when I contacted TDI headquarters, they saw nothing wrong with it. As long as the instruction met minimum TDI standards, they didn't care what else he taught us or made us do.
• A full 14 years ago, PADI published our article on teaching OW students while neutrally buoyant. I was told privately that they were phasing it in, and it would soon be the norm. It still isn't the norm. A few years ago SDI announced that instructors were now required to teach OW classes while neutrally buoyant. That turned out not to be true. SSI people said much the same thing. They were wrong, too.

As I said in my introduction, instructors do not like being told what to do, and thy will fight back tooth and nail. As an organization, you may feel the need to back down.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I have long had the feeling that a lot of the first decades of instruction involved a wide variety of instructional programs and techniques, and I feel it is very likely that individual instructors probably fought hard against any kind of standardization. I believe that in part because for a number of years my job was to teach innovative instructional techniques to high school teachers, and many of the those teachers made it damned clear that nobody was going to tell them how to teach.

Here are some tidbits from the world of scuba.

• One of the origins of instruction was the Scripps Institute in California, which in the early 1950s created an instructional program out of nothing in response to the death of a scuba diver. Other people began to teach scuba elsewhere, creating their own programs from their own ideas. Many had learned in the navy.
• Los Angeles County created a program based on the Scripps model, sending Al Tillman to Scripps to learn out how they did it.
• Tillman and others then tried to create a national program, which eventually became NAUI.
• According to the History of NAUI written by NAUI founders Al Tillman, et. al., in the seminal meeting in Houston , they brought in instructors from across the land, and these instructors brought their own ideas and methods. For example, Tillman wrote that the Los Angeles people were surprised to see dome of them harassing students by ripping off masks, turning off air, etc. They themselves did not approve, and felt it was done more for the amusement of the instructor than the education of the student.
• NAUI was then formed basically on the Scripps/Los Angeles model, but individual instructors were allowed to add to it as they saw fit. Students from that era may have gotten very different instruction, depending upon the instructor. You may think ripping off masks was how all scuba was once taught, but it wasn't.
• The YMCA had a similar issue, one that eventually led to the end of the program. Individual YMCA's fiercely defended the way they did things, and the organization did not have the central power to make things different.
• When I started tech training, the instruction was technically TDI, but the instructor flat out said that he would ignore the TDI standards and teach according to the GUE model. We students had no idea what we had to do to complete any of the courses--we just had to wait until the instructor announced that we had completed Advanced Nitrox, Decompression Procedures, etc. I was pissed, but when I contacted TDI headquarters, they saw nothing wrong with it. As long as the instruction met minimum TDI standards, they didn't care what else he taught us or made us do.
• A full 14 years ago, PADI published our article on teaching OW students while neutrally buoyant. I was told privately that they were phasing it in, and it would soon be the norm. It still isn't the norm. A few years ago SDI announced that instructors were now required to teach OW classes while neutrally buoyant. That turned out not to be true. SSI people said much the same thing. They were wrong, too.

As I said in my introduction, instructors do not like being told what to do, and thy will fight back tooth and nail. As an organization, you may feel the need to back down.

What about IDEA? They have been around since 1952 and claim to be the first recreational training agency.