I believe that improved quality comes from 5 approaches:
1. A sincere QA program.
2. Top-Down Quality Management
3. Empowering Quality Education
4. Progressive Skill Development
5. Improving Instructor Retention
QA needs to ensure that students are fully aware of what they should be achieving from training, before asking them for feedback on their course/instructor. The goals, skills and standards of a given course should be clearly defined to the student - along with an overall expectation of competency. This should be role-modeled by the agency through superlative and expert diving in training media and manuals.Video and still images must be carefully selected to display skill levels to which the trainee diver must aspire to master. They should be able to compare, or contrast, those skill levels with what they observe in their instructor. Customer provided QA feedback should also be backed-up with personal inspections. I'd love to see a 'mystery customer' QA program run by agencies.... for both courses and fun diving activities.
Top Down quality management really addresses the need to define standards through Instructor Trainer development. These are the people who literally shape the standard of diver education. From my perspective, ITs focus too much on training instructors to pass instructor courses, rather than to provide quality education. Instructor Trainers should role model apex level skills... many do not. Instructor courses should demand diving expertise as a pre-requisite - many do not. In respect to training instructors in specialty (specialist) diving areas - IT's are all too often not sufficiently expert in that specialism. Training the trainer is one thing. Training specialist diving skills is another.
Expertise should flow down the professional 'pyramid'. Sadly, there seems to be little demand for diving expertise at any level, for many agencies.
Agencies could also shape quality training by empowering dive instructors/centers to focus on quality, rather than quantity. We all understand how large agencies profit from quantity turn-over, at all training levels. We can see how perceptions are shaped that 'achievement' as an instructor (or IT) relates only to volume of student turn-over. There are no rewards for quality achievement. There is no incentive, nor motivation, for instructors/centers to strive for quality standards in skill development. Low prices, undemanding training and quick/convenient courses boost turnover. These are the antithesis of quality education.
Quick and convenient courses are obviously attractive to the modern generations. However, the concept of 'minimum requirements' has now become perceived as 'standard requirements'. Courses are advertised, quoted and sold on the basis of achieving certification in the bare minimum time and dives. We all understand that not every student (or many students) are really capable of achieving 'mastery' of a diverse skillset and new equipment within the bare minimum timescale. What's happened is that the industry degrades performance standards (the definition of 'mastery') to meet the timescale.... rather than increase the training timescale to meet needs of students obtaining 'mastery'.
This gross undertraining is hidden by increased molly-coddling of qualified divers. Divers who... supposedly trained to dive independently of supervision.... are capable of nothing more than following a DM like herded cattle... and who are reliant on that 'pro' support in every facet of their personal safety. It's a smokescreen to hide to the training deficit.
These problems are exasperated by a lack of core skill development in 'levels' of agency syllabus. Simply put, there is no re-testing, or expected progression of student core (fundamental) skill demanded by subsequent courses in an agencies' program. The agencies that DO demand skill progression (such as GUE) provide students, and instructors, with defined targets at each subsequent level... thus motivating divers to work independently on developing their diving skillset as they progress.
Even on a limited basis (course level to course level), a 'beginning with the next step in mind' philosophy could work wonders in promoting a focus on skill development. It needn't be 'beginning with the end in mind'... as not every diver aspires to technical diving levels.
This could be achieved by recognizing that pre-requisite qualifications for courses are meant to define an expected skill-set that the student can demonstrate. Courses should start with an assessment that proves the student can demonstrate the skill-set reflected by the certifications they hold. This should focus heavily on fundamental skills.
At staged levels (i.e. OW, AOW, Rescue, Deep/Wreck/Cavern)... the student should be expected to display a higher level of fundamental comptency, along with any specific comptencies demanded as pre-requisites. Lo and behold... students might start preparing themselves in advance of training..... less card collecting. And, of course, students would be able to identify previous instructors who 'short-changed' them in their training....as they'd be under-prepared for subsequent assessments/courses (and there's where a QA process has value).
Instructor retention is low in a volume-orientated market. Low course prices means low income for the educators. For most instructors, a prolonged 'career' in diving is unsustainable.... especially when family responsibilities come about. This results in a deficit of full-time, professional instructors. The employment pool is dominated by 1-2 years dilettantes... part-timer/bobby instructors and, a few, specialist (normally technical/cave type) instructors. The industry does not effectively protect it's expertise, nor allow it to flourish.
