Nitrox and other academic lessons online

[Teamcasa]

PADI has announced its intention to put the Nitrox course online. Is this good for the dive industry and safe for the divers? Frankly I think if a diver is commmited to learning they will seek out the information online first and follow it by being tested on their knowledge and certified by a live instructor.

Afterall, Nitrox diving is not all that hard to understand and with more and more Nitrox capable computers, diving with it is much safer today.

 

[deepstops]

While it's mostly academic, I think there's still some benefit to the hands-on part of the class to analyze tanks. But that's easily enough handled by a competent LDS the first time the student gets his/her first nitrox fill.

I think it's acceptable.

 

[300bar]

Dave,

IMO,nitrox is one of the courses most suiteable of online training,you don't NEED dives for it.
You just NEED to understand the differences and dangers of higher O2 pressures on a dive.

IMO an online OW student misses out to much 1st hand info an OWSI can give.
For nitrox you only need to SEE HOW an analizer works.

 

[ligersandtions]

Funny you should start a thread about this today....I just (as in minutes ago) finished my online SDI Nitrox course. I've spent a lot of time studying Nitrox, reading, talking with experienced divers, etc....it killed me to think that I was going to have to pay for a Nitrox class and get nothing out of it. I posted a thread on another forum to ask if I was being silly to think that I would not get anything out of a Nitrox class and to see if it would be worth my time and money (turns out, there are a couple classes I would have taken, given the time and money....but it was based on the instructor, the extra things they go over like rescuing a toxing diver, and going further in depth with the information than just telling you how to calculate you MOD -- or even worse, how to program your computer and let it do all the thinking for you). Unfortunately, I didn't have the time or money to do it the way I would have liked to....so I settled for the cheapest class I could find (and that was the online SDI course).

I believe an online course for Nitrox is perfectly acceptable. It should, of course, be linked to a dive shop (with an instructor), as you'd still need to do that practical portion of it....and that person should be able to answer any questions one has. But given some general math skills, the desire to learn a little more, and some self-discipline, I think an online Nitrox course is a good idea.

However, I would have to say that the SDI course is pretty crappy. It suggests that you use a computer to plan your dive, calculate your MOD, have it warn you if you come close to your MOD or oxygen exposure time (without having you put any thought into it....it even says you probably should not dive Nitrox with your computer set to air as you will not get warned when you reach your MOD)....tells you what your EAD is without going through the calculations to show you how they got it....uses a PO2 as 1.6 almost exclusively, only mentioning you might want to be a little more conservative once at the end of the course.

So, yes, I think Nitrox classes can be done effectively as an online course, but I don't think SDI has done a good job of it. If you want a good overview of Nitrox, I'd suggest looking HERE.

However, a class that requires dives probably would not be a good online course....though maybe an online supplement could be useful.

 

[elan]

If they do that the way they did OW class it's not as good as it might seem. The subscription expires after one year and you do not get any materials.

The way Nitrox is done now is pretty much self study anyways you read the book watch DVD the instructor summarizes everything, gives more formulas, makes the test and give practical hands on experience. I do not see what can this online course replace in this chain. It can be just another way to present material. Instead of getting the crew pack you just have it online I guess. But having the crew pack I get tables book and the DVD which I can re-read later as I do with some OW chapters of my wife's book.

I regret I have wasted $120 on PADI online OW course to be honest.

 

[Web Monkey]

PADI has announced its intention to put the Nitrox course online. Is this good for the dive industry and safe for the divers? Frankly I think if a diver is commmited to learning they will seek out the information online first and follow it by being tested on their knowledge and certified by a live instructor.

I'm guessing Open Water is next. I predicted this months ago and want credit when all PADI SCUBA classes are online with a quick checkout dive Someplace Warm on vacation.

Terry

 

[Teamcasa]

It's not really what's next but more the whole idea of online learning the academics of Nitrox outside of a classroom? After all, learning the ins-n-outs of Nitrox is just a bit of theory and some math.
As far as I'm concerned, diving Nitrox is a simple matter and provided the diver follows the basic rules of not exceeding their MOD, know how to calibrate and use an analyser along with a clear understanding of how to use both their computer and the dive tables, it is not a big deal.

 

[redacted]

I guess PADI has decided they can deal with some dissatisfied instructors more easily than they can deal with the loss of nitrox certifications to other agencies, like SDI who has offered nitrox, on line, for a while now. SDI still brings the instructor in for a final test and a tank analysis.

 

[Sinbad the Diver]

Don't want to hijack the thread, but can someone explain to me the problem with On-line training for the academic portion of OW or any other class?

Using OW as an example, rather than reading the book and answering the questions then going over them with the instructor in the class you read the stuff on-line, answer the questions and the computer tells you when you are wrong. In both cases you then go to a pool for training and to OW for checkout dives. In my case it would have allowed me to save an hour in a class the 4 nights we did training and just go to the pool.

Maybe I'm off base, but I don't see pool or OW dives being replaced by on-line training.

 

[TwoBitTxn]

Pool and OW will not be replaced by online training. It can't be.

But what can happen is the time spent in the classroom can be replaced with more time in the pool where to a degree it can be more valuable. A student does the academics online, comes to the shop, takes a short exam, and then instead of several hours in the classroom that time is moved to the pool teaching skills.

Everyone can win here.