Ripped off for my AOW training
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You have not been "ripped off" because what you describe is typical of the content of an AOW course.
When people ask me what (PADI) AOW is about, I tell them it is a way after completing the OW course to get five more dives in the company of an instructor under your belt before you go off into the world on your own, and anything else you may learn in the course is gravy. My wife says she learned a few things in her AOW course, but I don't think I learned anything new in mine. It's a total crapshoot, as so much of it is up to the individual instructor.
When people ask me what (PADI) AOW is about, I tell them it is a way after completing the OW course to get five more dives in the company of an instructor under your belt before you go off into the world on your own, and anything else you may learn in the course is gravy. My wife says she learned a few things in her AOW course, but I don't think I learned anything new in mine. It's a total crapshoot, as so much of it is up to the individual instructor.
flots am
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PADI's AOW card is nothing more than a sampling of some other specialties, not each entire class, and requires 5 dives. This is documented in the card's description, and not a secret.
With some other agencies, (SSI for example), AOW means you took 4 additional, complete specialty classes and have at least 24 dives.
Depending on whether you like to accept responsibility or blame someone, you could either say you were mislead and cheated, or just signed up for the wrong thing.
flots.
Well oldish guy here, when we were certified in the stone age we got an open water card that entitled the owner to fill a tank of air, and within reason to dive to the limits of recreational diving (only kind you could do if you were not in the navy or a commercial diver). so first and only card and we dived to 130ft followed our tables and never knew we needed more. the next available card was divemaster.
now for some reason we have AOW, Rescue, junior master card owner, and deep certification. why? of course back then there were 5 classroom sessions at 2-3 hours each. and we went to the pool 4 times. so maybe it is all that is missing in OW that requires the new cards. I do not know and it is not my business to recommend to any industry what they might or might not do.
a lot has been said that the OPs course was standard, well that is a shame, but at the same time he could have asked his instructor for more.
My AOW was boat from a canoe with a 250 johnson outboard on it in 3ft swells, and I walked up hill in the snow both ways. we did a night dive in the ocean, and my navigation required actual compass use and knowledge, we did deep dives to 95ft on a wreck and had to do timed math problems at that depth, bouyancy was tested and confirmed on all dives. well fortunatly we had all this available to us, if we were trying to do it in a lake we may have had some issues.
if I had a student say they wanted to actually learn something in an AOW class I would teach the heck out of it, but I think a lot of people just want the card so that when they go to Florida they can dive on the boats without anyone lifting an eyebrow.
now for some reason we have AOW, Rescue, junior master card owner, and deep certification. why? of course back then there were 5 classroom sessions at 2-3 hours each. and we went to the pool 4 times. so maybe it is all that is missing in OW that requires the new cards. I do not know and it is not my business to recommend to any industry what they might or might not do.
a lot has been said that the OPs course was standard, well that is a shame, but at the same time he could have asked his instructor for more.
My AOW was boat from a canoe with a 250 johnson outboard on it in 3ft swells, and I walked up hill in the snow both ways. we did a night dive in the ocean, and my navigation required actual compass use and knowledge, we did deep dives to 95ft on a wreck and had to do timed math problems at that depth, bouyancy was tested and confirmed on all dives. well fortunatly we had all this available to us, if we were trying to do it in a lake we may have had some issues.
if I had a student say they wanted to actually learn something in an AOW class I would teach the heck out of it, but I think a lot of people just want the card so that when they go to Florida they can dive on the boats without anyone lifting an eyebrow.
There's gold in them thar waves!
If they didn't have tons of different cards, the agencies and associated shops and instructors would make less money. It's not complicated, nor mysterious. It's also obvious that it's not about safety or any other thing than money. I've been on a few boats where the captain was not working for a "shop" and didn't offer classes. No surprise, but those captains didn't ask for an AOW card to do dives deeper than 60'. The boats that have asked me were also selling training.
One of my regular buddies has one of those old NSDS cards that was supposed to be good to 130'. I think he said something about a cavern in his classes, too. He was turned away from a dive in the keys due to not having an aow card, despite having been diving for longer than I've been alive.
Did mine in 2006 and had to calculate a series of repetitive dives - at depth - using tables. (I was hoping to have to open a combination lock or similar.) At the time I was deathly afraid of failing the course, not realizing that the purpose was to demonstrate narcosis rather than test my ability to overcome it.
Ironically, I took AOW at a resort in Hawaii as logged dives #5-10. Did this because I didn't have a buddy, and the price of the course was only about $10 more than the a la carte prices for doing 5 dives (including boat charter costs) with a hired DM/guide. Didn't expect to learn anything, but lo and behold the instructor I had actually cared enough to work with me on navigation, bouyancy, propulsion, gear configuration, etc. He also spent roughly an hour on academics/discussion/briefing for each of the five dives.
I ended up with a card AND better skills at the end of the course - go figure!
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Five guided dives ain't worth $400. You can hire a private dive guide for way less than that.
If a course can't offer you new things to learn, it's not worth taking ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
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Yeah, because everybody does math problems in their head when they're diving.
Things like this ... puzzles ... writing your name backward ... they're useful I suppose for demonstrating to someone that they're narc'd. On the other hand, it should go without saying that at those depths you're going to be narc'd. Why not have them do something they might ever actually need at depth outside of class ... like, an OOA drill? It brings home some important concepts ... narcosis (a) affects your ability to recognize a problem exists, and (b) affects your ability to decide what to do about it, and (c) affects your ability to react once you're done deciding ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
flots am
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While it's fashionable to blame PADI for the "dumbing down" of OW and the proliferation of "specialty" classes, in reality, you can blame the consumers (students) for demanding shorter classes.
This is the same reason McDonalds has a drive-through and a dollar menu. People want it, even though they don't actually realize what they're asking for or getting until they get into the water and something bad happens.
flots
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