SSI or PADI

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I have also trained with both and completely DISAGREE with this except that it is all (almost) about the instructor.
I taught for both, starting with PADI. When I switched to SSI, I made it a point to remove all fun activities from my classes. :yeahbaby:
 
Do PADI still charge you for an electronic copy of every cert card? SSI give that for free.
They do but there are a couple of workarounds.

They send an electronic card that is valid for 30 days. Some people take a screen shot of that card on their phone.

The other way is what I have done. When I get my physical card I take a picture of it and save it on my phone...BAM, electronic copy.
 
They do but there are a couple of workarounds.

They send an electronic card that is valid for 30 days. Some people take a screen shot of that card on their phone.

The other way is what I have done. When I get my physical card I take a picture of it and save it on my phone...BAM, electronic copy.
If you have not seen it, SSI has a really nice app that includes all the certifications. Their digital content from instruction to dive log to storing certs is second to none. I have to tip my hat to them for that.
 
If you have not seen it, SSI has a really nice app that includes all the certifications. Their digital content from instruction to dive log to storing certs is second to none. I have to tip my hat to them for that.
Thanks for the heads up. I will check it out
 
There is no need to be on your knees ever, not even in confined water 1.

Nope. Going to your knees is a decent way to transition to laying on your back at the bottom of the pool. And that is necessary in order to learn how to blow air rings, which is the funnest thing to do in the pool.
 
Nope. Going to your knees is a decent way to transition to laying on your back at the bottom of the pool. .
If you wish to take more time getting students to neutral buoyancy and proper trim, that’s your choice.
 
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I dive in two different quarries and I see hordes after hordes of Advanced Open Water courses being done by different shops and different instructors. This is what they look like:


kneeling (2:04) hand on the ground to maintain buoyancy (1:19) girls octo dragging in the mud (1:19), everything you see in this video and a whole lot more is what I will see every single weekend that I am there through not one but horde after horde after horde after horde. The students that I witness kick so much muck that the vis get messed up and you will have to swim to the other end of the quarry to get those 20 feet of vis that the quarry advertises. Google "PADI AOW" and you will see many such videos, posted by extremely proud AOW students who are given shiny c-cards by hundred of instructors around the world from Caribbean to Philippines Thailand convincing them that they have achieved something. The word "advanced" has a marketing pull to it specially when it is printed on a shiny card.

No Sir, this is not about a lone instructor not following standards. It is about an industry that sells "plastic achievements" to people who do not know any better. My PADI Advanced Open Water was a bigger circus that I will describe below.

I have also seen multiple UTD classes happening. This is what they look like:


My own UTD course was similar to the above. It was not at all like the experience you described. Unlike my PADI AOW, my UTD Essentials had actual videos shown to us days before we even jumped in the pool. Before we jumped in we knew what we were required to do. Prior to jumping in the pool there were land-drills demonstrated by the instructor.

Once we were in the pool, the instructor would demonstrate a skill, ask us to perform it and correct any flaws. Then we were video taped and we would return back to the classroom to look at our techniques in class. It was quite enlightening to see that we were never where we thought we were and this gave us the exact area to focus on. At no point was anyone ridiculed or made fun of. The instructor was very picky and would point on extremely minor details that I would never have gotten myself. I did not take that in a negative way because that is what I am paying them for. In the end, I did not get a pass at the first attempt but I left with a very clear idea of what I need to work on, on my own in order to get a pass. I put in a few more sessions in the quarry and sent the video to the instructor and he felt that I was good enough to get a tech pass.

As opposed to 5 days of the above training, my own PADI AOW was 2 days. No instructional videos were shown to me. I was told to follow a compass in 100 feet of vis and come back to the instructor while doing underwater navigation. Prior to taking AOW I was already using a compass so this was not anything I gained in the course. I was given a pat on the back for completing "Underwater Navigation!" Then we swam around a wreck and that was a "wreck dive" checked off. He also doubled it as a deep specialty since the wreck was 100ish. Later on I found out that it was violation of standards since wreck and deep had to be two separate dives by PADI standards. I never realized that for years so by the time I found out that part it had become an old story. Must I mention that while attempting to make PADI wreck and PADI deep the same dive, my instructor made me run out of air. Advanced gas planning was not part of PADI AOW as it was part of my UTD Essentials so one the way up I was low. I had to do an air share with my instructor and when I surfaced, the divemaster was upset at me for running out of air. My instructor and DM on the boat had a huge argument over me running out of air because the instructor was on a boat charter.The next day we did a drift dive except there was no drift. He said that if there was current this is what you will do and then it was a guided dive on the reef rather than an instructional experience.

While my own PADI AOW was a total load of BS where major standards were violated, the courses I witness almost every weekend at my quarry are not as horrible. Still they are no where near the level where UTD courses are. My UTD Essential exposed me to concepts like dvanced Gas planning, rock bottom calculations, converting surface consumption rate to depth consumption rate and stuff that I did not hear until I did TDI Technical diving.

That UTD video is eye opening. Hand on the ground to maintain buoyancy (0:39) kneeling on the bottom (throughout).
 

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