NAUI versus PADI

[MichaelMc]

Thanks John and Diver0001, excellent answers. As have been most or all.

If your IDC trainer shows A (horrid clear) as bad, B (good clear on knees) as good, that defines your standard.

In IDC showing C (good clear in basic hover) as preferred would be a nice step under the current standards.

Edit:
Teaching IDC with knees as at most a deprecated method on its way out would be a good transition approach. And it would benefit the OW students as the better faster safer way to learn.

 

[Diver0001]

As someone who has taken a lot of courses, but who is not an instructor, I don't feel particularly good about instructors who "go beyond the standards" in the sense of requiring (and not just offering) additional skills for certification. There is an expectation going into a course that it will be taught to standards. That is, you are taught the skills that are in the book, and if you perform them adequately (correctly, repeatedly, and fluidly for the level of diving that you are seeking certification for), you'll receive the card. There is a lot of thought and collective wisdom put into those standards by the certification agency and for a single instructor to think he knows better and require his students to do more borders on hubris for me. If you really think the standards are insufficient, work to get them changed.

I would tend to agree. NAUI and CMAS are the two bigger agencies that allow the instructor to more or less do what they want provided they cover at least everything in the standard. PADI and some others will tolerate the instructor going out of the box but recommend against it for risk management reasons. In the PADI system, the instructor cannot withhold certification based upon skills that are not in the standard.

The difference is in the philosophy regarding the role of the instructor. Should the instructor use the standard to create his/her own course or should the instructor's job be to deliver the course as the agency designed it? There are, in fact, arguments for both approaches and that's why both approaches exist. My thinking is if the standard is good enough then the instructor shouldn't have to be adding anything.

R..

 

[RainPilot]

When I taught for NAUI back in the day, a negative entry off a RIB was not part of the agency standards but all of the instructors in that area had added it.

Hot drops when you are diving in the breeding ground of the great white are absolutely necessary and since the students wanted to dive there after certification they needed to get with the program.

Since the type of diving we were having to do was totally different from the majority of places where the agency had representatives it was really nice to be able to add the necessary.

 

[RainPilot]

Many standards for rec agencies are "just good enough " mostly to accommodate the financial interests of the shops selling courses.

Nothing wrong with that per se and ALL agencies do the same. However, if I and a student decide that "good enough" is not what we want, then adding a higher bar is not a bad thing.

 

[boulderjohn]

If you were to read the 2011 article in the PADI journal that introduced neutral buoyancy instruction, you will see an often overlooked sentence. Both the history of the sentence and its implications are important.

The first draft of the article was 2-3 times longer than the final version, and Karl Shreeves from PADI headquarters had the job of working with me on the final draft. (You will see that he is listed as a co-author.) It seemed to me that he had never seen OW instruction done this way, but I could be wrong. Our original draft was very much against instruction on the knees, but he insisted on wording that said it was OK to initiate skill instruction on the knees. I was not happy, but I wanted it published. We whittled his intentions down to one sentence that said that if skills are introduced on the knees, they need to be taught again in horizontal neutral position, hopefully in the same instructional session.

That was the result of a back and forth exchange in which I pointed out that in many cases, skills performed on the knees are done differently from the way they are done while swimming. In the regulator recovery, both methods are completely different. In mask clearing, a horizontal diver MUST tip the head back to clear the mask--it is counterproductive if the head is already up because the diver is kneeling. Horizontal students approach each other and secure the regulator in the OOA skill than they do while kneeling. When teaching on the knees, you are teaching skills differently than the way students will use them when they dive. That is why he agreed that if they are taught first on the knees, they had to be taught again while neutral and horizontal.

I think most people will agree that teaching a skill twice takes longer than teaching it once.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I believe many courses are optimized for the tropical, look at pretty fish diving. The level of risk in those areas can be dramatically different to areas where the water is cold, dark, and strong currents. That requires something extra.

 

[Akimbo]

... In the PADI system, the instructor cannot withhold certification based upon skills that are not in the standard...

How does that work in different environmental conditions? For example, Northern Norway versus Palau. Drysuits are essentially a given in Norway so do students have to buy a drysuit class when they take OW or can an instructor fail them in OW because their buoyancy control in a drysuit is dangerous?

 

[boulderjohn]

How does that work in different environmental conditions? For example, Northern Norway versus Palau. Drysuits are essentially a given in Norway so do students have to buy a drysuit class when they take OW or can an instructor fail them in OW because their buoyancy control in a drysuit is dangerous?

If a drysuit is needed for a class, then students must be instructed in the use of a drysuit as a part of the class. It is listed in the standards. Whether the drysuit is loaned as part of the class, rented, or purchased is up to the policies of the shop/instructor.

 

[boulderjohn]

It is interesting that this thread, which started as an all out attack on PADI and praise for NAUI, has morphed into a discussion of PADI's efforts to improve open water instruction by having students taught while neutrally buoyant rather than on the knees. I have no idea what NAUI is doing in this regard. Perhaps a NAUI instructor can tell us what efforts NAUI has made along these lines.

 

[MichaelMc]

It is interesting that this thread, which started as an all out attack on PADI and praise for NAUI, has morphed into a discussion of PADI's efforts to improve open water instruction by having students taught while neutrally buoyant rather than on the knees. I have no idea what NAUI is doing in this regard. Perhaps a NAUI instructor can tell us what efforts NAUI has made along these lines.

I'm not a NAUI instructor, rather a NAUI DM candidate within the dive program at an AAUS academic institution, both of which organizations allow local higher or additional standards, and I have not read the NAUI OW instructor manual.

Some items in the NAUI policy and standards manual, under OW (Scuba) diver, include:
- Hover without support or significant movement
- Hover at a depth of approximately 15 feet (4.6 m) for three minutes
- If wearing a standard buckle type weight belt and submerged in a prone position at the
bottom or while hovering, adjust the position of the weight system so that the ballast is evenly distributed.
- If wearing a weight-integrated weight system, and submerged in a prone position at the
bottom or while hovering, remove and replace at least one weight pocket, if permitted by the weight system. If necessary, assistance is allowed to replace the weight pocket.
- Dive using skills that have a minimal impact on the environment
- Share air as both a donor and a receiver from an octopus or alternate breathing source (not buddy breathing) during ascents in confined water and from a minimum depth of 15 feet (4.6 m) to the surface in open water
- Bring a diver simulating unconsciousness to the surface from a depth of approximately 10 feet (3 m), remove victim’s weight system, mask and snorkel; simulate in-water rescue breathing.

So air share mid water while (safely) ascending, hovering, and weight adjust/remove/replace; though not that I see BC remove/replace. I’d note that the PADI weight remove/replace is for all or part of the weight system. So a stricter rule on air share done neutral, but no BC remove that I see. Yet safely bringing an unconscious buddy to the surface requires good buoyancy control of two peoples BCs and wetsuits. And continuing their rescue is fairly good on safety. All these are confined and open water skills. I do not understand any of these to be new efforts.

The overarching standard that I recall is would you be happy for them to dive with your family, and the academic freedom to enforce that, not just teach it. But all I currently find is for instructors that you ‘would allow that person to teach their loved ones to dive.’ Which appears as the first item in the credo. Not that that directly addresses whether skills on knees are fine. Though if you require air share during an ascent, allowing descent to the bottom to clear a mask would seem inconsistent. NAUI does say that they establish 'minimum standards', and instructors may 'exceed NAUI standards in ways that do not jeopardize student safety.' As was pointed out by other anecdotes, I am sure there are NAUI instructors that violate standards, as with most organizations. There are mechanisms to correct that.

I think we would need an instructor for more, particularly guidance about teaching. My experience assisting is in a post OW context, and usually post AOW, and is more about safely working underwater doing science, for example counting kelp and invertebrates. We test skills midwater in the ocean, but that might just be us and/or us within AAUS.

Edit:
The integrated weight remove/replace description is new to at least the 2017 standards, the rest appear at least as far back as the 2012.