PADI master scuba diver rating

[Dirty-Dog]

Sorry, but it can be required in some cases.

I had (still have, actually) a student who was a typical vacation, warm water resort diver who had never done a single specialty, including nitrox. He is a scientist, and he wanted to do some dives in a national park related to the studies he was doing there. The park told him he could only do it if he had master scuba diver certification. We worked on that, making sure he had 5 good and useful specialties. We did nitrox (which he needed for his work), TecReational Diver (similar to GUE Fundamentals), Advanced Diver Planning (a very through look at everything you need to know to plan and execute dives in any setting), Deep Diver, Dry Suit (the lake temperatures were below 40° F), and a couple of others, so he had more than enough. Once he had that certification, he was allowed to do his diving. More importantly, he was now a totally different diver from what he was before that. In his case, it was a very worthwhile pursuit.

On the other hand, I am an instructor for two different agencies (PADI and TDI), and I am certified for both Advanced Trimix and cave diving. I do not, however, have the Master Scuba Diver certification.

OK, but that is an arbitrary requirement made by a group that doesn't know anything about diving. The MSD is a worthless piece of paper, except for those who want to collect cards.
In his case, the specialty courses were worthwhile. The MSD, in and of itself, remains useless.

 

[Phil_C]

OK, but that is an arbitrary requirement made by a group that doesn't know anything about diving. The MSD is a worthless piece of paper, except for those who want to collect cards.
In his case, the specialty courses were worthwhile. The MSD, in and of itself, remains useless.

Totally agree, before I knew any better I dived with someone who had a MSD card, it was a fairly simple shore dive, which dropped to 120 foot almost straight from the shore and had some current. That card, and someone else's recommendation that they were a good diver, gave me a VERY false sense of how good and comfortable a diver the person was. In short they struggled with the conditions and didn't do the second dive.

Since then I have done archaeological diving on projects where (UK law) specifies that CMAS 3* or equivalent is the required standard to allow participation. Even then I think that conditions like this are just an attempt to have a standard that people who nothing about the subject can use like a crutch and rely on to get out of assessing divers skills.

My vote is in the camp that MSD is generally just a means for PADI to collect money and kid people that they are at the pinnacle of diving skills. Yes depending on the specialities and more depending on the instructor it can be a good process to go through. But in my opinion it proves nothing about your actual skill levels. - P

 

[boulderjohn]

My vote is in the camp that MSD is generally just a means for PADI to collect money and kid people that they are at the pinnacle of diving skills.

First of all, PADI gets very little money when a person gets a MSD rating--not much more than it takes to process the card. As a money maker, I imagine it barely causes a blip on the radar screen of their financials.

Next, you have to go to the history of the certification to understand the thinking behind it and why it may not make sense today.

In the earliest days of scuba instruction, there were only a few agencies, and there were essentially only two certifications: diver and instructor. Eventually there was a realization that people did not need to do intensive course work for 6 months and spend the equivalent of several thousand dollars in today's money in order to look at a Caribbean reef for a day or two while on vacation, and what used to be the open water certification was broken into a couple of levels and a handful of specialties. I believe it was NAUI that first came up with the Master Scuba Diver rating, but I could be wrong. Whether it was NAUI or PADI who came up with the idea first, the simple fact was that in those days, a diver who earned that rating had pretty much taken every course available. According to an article I had to read on this when I was certified as an instructor, PADI's thinking for the rating was based on Boy Scouts, where ranks above First Class Scout are based on the number of merit badges earned. There weren't many more than 5 specialties available then, so that seemed like a good number for the master rating. The idea of putting a name to it (MSD) was for incentive purposes. The thinking was that if people wanted to reach the top rank in the sport, they would take the needed classes.

Today's divers have so many more paths open to them that the old MSD rating does not make a lot of sense any more.

 

[TMHeimer]

Totally agree, before I knew any better I dived with someone who had a MSD card, it was a fairly simple shore dive, which dropped to 120 foot almost straight from the shore and had some current. That card, and someone else's recommendation that they were a good diver, gave me a VERY false sense of how good and comfortable a diver the person was. In short they struggled with the conditions and didn't do the second dive.

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OTOH, when I did my 50th dive and got my MSD that day I buddied with a MSD who was outstanding (believe he got his DM later on). I've posted often that the value of this rating depends on which specialties you do and, of course, on the instructor. But it is simply a rating, nothing more. We all know there are DMs and Instructors who are not up to par. I have a Masters in Music, but that doesn't mean I was a good or bad Band teacher. You can't rely on someone's credentials in figuring how good they are at it. Again OTOH, percentages say those with more qualifications are generally better.

 

[spc751]

SSI also has a Master Diver card but it's requirements are even lower than PADI's.

 

[Curtis Dawson]

I am already set to take the PADI Rescue diver and Dive Master courses and plan on taking some of the recreational specialty courses followed by PADI Tech courses. I have no desire to do cave diving: thank you very much. My main wish is that I can be the best ( instruction and safety) instructor that I can be. I know that no matter how good a job that I do I will miss something but I want my students to live a long healthy life. And have no one say that" the scuba instructor failed them".

 

[Steve_C]

Don't think it is just PADI. I did MSD with SDI. I sometimes go to an SDI shop and they have a MSD also.

It gives folks who are not aiming for the pro ranks something to aim for and encourage them to do more diving. Sort of like being a BA in college. There is no course called BA. But you have to take a bunch of courses and when you get the degree there is a feeling of accomplishment. And there is often a graduation fee if you want the piece of paper.

Perhaps I read the requirements wrong at the time but when I did my PADI DM, I went back to pick up the deep certification since I thought it was required even though I had done a number of deep dives.

I note that "join a dive club" seems to be a common suggestion from our European brothers. I sense that the dive club is a more common thing and more organized over there as opposed to a dive shop run program that schedules a few dives and a couple cookouts which is what I have seen here in the states.

 

[boulderjohn]

I am already set to take the PADI Rescue diver and Dive Master courses and plan on taking some of the recreational specialty courses followed by PADI Tech courses. I have no desire to do cave diving: thank you very much. My main wish is that I can be the best ( instruction and safety) instructor that I can be. I know that no matter how good a job that I do I will miss something but I want my students to live a long healthy life. And have no one say that" the scuba instructor failed them".

If you really want to be an instructor, then just go straight to DM and go on from there. Pick specialties that are meaningful to you and your total diving experience.

Tech diving will take a lot of your time and money. I suggest you think of one thing or the other (instructor or tech) for a while. I did not start tech until I had been an instructor for a couple of years. It probably would have been better if I had reversed that order.

---------- Post added November 2nd, 2013 at 04:26 PM ----------

My vote is in the camp that MSD is generally just a means for PADI to collect money and kid people that they are at the pinnacle of diving skills. Yes depending on the specialities and more depending on the instructor it can be a good process to go through. But in my opinion it proves nothing about your actual skill levels. - P

I believe it was NAUI that first came up with the Master Scuba Diver rating,

SSI also has a Master Diver card but it's requirements are even lower than PADI's.

Don't think it is just PADI. I did MSD with SDI. I sometimes go to an SDI shop and they have a MSD also.

For those of you who are new to ScubaBoard, please be advised that the standard procedure is to mock PADI for doing what just about every other agency does, pretending that they are the only ones who do it.

 

[Phil_C]

I note that "join a dive club" seems to be a common suggestion from our European brothers. I sense that the dive club is a more common thing and more organized over there as opposed to a dive shop run program that schedules a few dives and a couple cookouts which is what I have seen here in the states.

Yep - I belong to two clubs in the UK, both BSAC (British Sub Aqua Club) and both have weekly pool sessions where they rent a municipal pool after normal hours and conduct pool training every week. One is a 3 metre pool, but the other is a 5 metre deep pool so good for many sorts of practice and gear shakedowns. There are a range of skills and levels within the clubs from national level and technical instructors to new divers just starting out. Even on ordinary club dives you are always learning from more experienced divers.

Most weeks someone is going to an inland dive site (I live 70 miles from the nearest coast) and during the summer there are normally a choice of trips to various coastal sites each weekend. One club has about 40 members of which 30 probably are active diving members, the other club has about 130 members. There are several diving rebreathers, many diving Trimix and other technical configurations.

Beyond paying club and national BSAC membership (about 10-15 pounds a month) you pay for a training pack when you start training for a grade (30-40 pounds) then all in club training and so on is 'free' except for the beers you buy your instructor and so.

So it is very different from my experience of doing a dive shop run course. My own CMAS training was also run similarly, I paid the fee and then dived over a period of a couple of months at a dive club abroad and when I had completed the required skills and experience was certified. There were classroom lectures a couple of times a week for a couple of months, so 20-30 hours worth, and some dives which were specified as training dives, and plenty of experience dives in between.

OK it's not a model that will work for resort or 'commercial' courses such as PADI but I am glad I did it that way, and even now still have plenty of opportunities to dive with Buddies I have trained with and dived with before.

I'm in Cyprus at the moment where I also belong to a dive club, and I got a text earlier - tomorrow we are meeting and doing a boat dive with a bunch of friends at the dive club and it will only cost fuel and air so what could be better.

P

 

[lostcajun]

For those of you who are new to ScubaBoard, please be advised that the standard procedure is to mock PADI for doing what just about every other agency does, pretending that they are the only ones who do it.

I just want to be a increasingly competent diver. I don't mind the courses and the specialties. And I don't mind compensating my instructors. I think if motorcycle licenses required more training like scuba there just might be fewer fatalities. Yes, I had a Harley and had too many close friends die, not always related to bad skills, but sometimes just being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Scuba problems could arise in a very similar way. So, I've very interested in learning. I don't really care about MSD, but I do care about being able to talk about number of dives and instructional experiences.

On our liveaboard this Summer in Belize one of our companion passengers was a DM and was willing to give some suggestions to those of us who were open to his observations. I learned a lot from him in casual conversations throughout the day, and I'm thankful for his instruction as well as the instruction of others...