Suit filed in case of "Girl dead, boy injured at Glacier National Park

[KevinNM]

Consider the power of ‘and’.

 

[Insideout]

I'm sure it's been said already, but reading this almost made me physically ill. It's as if they were actively trying to kill her.

This is paraphrased, but there's a video where an instructor for -- not really sure which agency -- spends a fair bit of time hoping that this sticks to PADI and hits them in the bottom line. Either they're responsible for the people who carry their brand, use their materials and training methods, and are (theoretically) following their standards, OR their quality control and quality assurance processes aren't worth the paper they're written on.

I believe James from Divers Ready is affiliated with TDI.

This isn't a PADI problem, this is an industry problem.
Diver training has become so watered down that it is basically a joke.
It's been reduced to the point so that tourists can get certified over a few days on a holiday. It's no wonder that there are so many people with weak skills.

It's no wonder that there are so many useless specialty courses available hat should be part of the basic certification.
Peak performance boyancy, navigation, dsmb, night and probably more.

I agree the standards to become an instructor are also pretty low, the checking and verification of instructor competency needs to be improved as with the process for professional certification.

 

[boulderjohn]

Diver training has become so watered down that it is basically a joke.

Can you list the requirements that have been removed from the OW class in the last 30 years?

 

[Wookie]

Can you list the requirements that have been removed from the OW class in the last 30 years?

Your comprehension is lacking for a professional educator.

Please point out where he said requirements have been removed.

He said training is watered down.

 

[Ayisha]

It's no wonder that there are so many useless specialty courses available hat should be part of the basic certification.
Peak performance boyancy, navigation, dsmb, night and probably more.

That's what my Brother-in-Law said when I did my AOW in 2002. His Padi O/W course in the mid-1980's was 2 months long and very thorough. He couldn't understand how U/W Navigation, Peak Performance Buoyancy, Night, Deep, etc. that I did as Adventure Dives were left out of the OW course. He actually asked how anyone could be certified without what he considered basic, essential skills.

That was my first inkling of how much things had changed with the 2 weekend (1 weekend class & pool; 1 weekend O/W) course.

 

[kaylee_ann]

Can you list the requirements that have been removed from the OW class in the last 30 years?

I think he’s talking about instructors. And how agencies don’t do crap to strip the licenses of subpar instructors

 

[kaylee_ann]

I believe James from Divers Ready is affiliated with TDI.

This isn't a PADI problem, this is an industry problem.
Diver training has become so watered down that it is basically a joke.
It's been reduced to the point so that tourists can get certified over a few days on a holiday. It's no wonder that there are so many people with weak skills.

It's no wonder that there are so many useless specialty courses available hat should be part of the basic certification.
Peak performance boyancy, navigation, dsmb, night and probably more.

I agree the standards to become an instructor are also pretty low, the checking and verification of instructor competency needs to be improved as with the process for professional certification.

Yep, TDI.
Buoyancy should be close to mastered in OW classes…I feel like it’s a necessity for protecting the ocean life as well as general diving comfort. The others are basic safety…

 

[Searcaigh]

Buoyancy should be close to mastered in OW classes

It appears to be omitted or forgotten by most divers from what I've seen of most who try to swim like seahorses (no offence to the seahorses), and kick silt up everywhere reducing visibility and destroying flora and fauna.

 

[boulderjohn]

So when we are saying that instruction has been watered down, we are talking about individual instructors and not the agency standards, and this is something new. Got it.

BTW, here is a history of NAUI, written by the people who created it, starting in 1960. If you read it, you will find the section where they talk about the problem they had from the very beginning, knowing that individual instructors were certifying people who had not done all the required work. They knew of cases in which students were certified without taking the class at all. They did not know how to solve that problem.

 

[Wookie]

So when we are saying that instruction has been watered down, we are talking about individual instructors and not the agency standards, and this is something new. Got it.

BTW, here is a history of NAUI, written by the people who created it, starting in 1960. If you read it, you will find the section where they talk about the problem they had from the very beginning, knowing that individual instructors were certifying people who had not done all the required work. They knew of cases in which students were certified without taking the class at all. They did not know how to solve that problem.

Nor do I. It seems to be human nature that some folks gut through and maintain high standards for themselves in their jobs, and others slack off. The ones that maintain impossibly high standards tend to burn out. I was certainly burnt out running a dive boat to my standards, which many didn’t agree with, but in 20 years I was never sued, which counts for something. Jim Lapenta, agree or disagree, burnt out. Perhaps you got tired of fighting with dive shops over your standards vs their standards.

Others slack off. Maybe they slack off by the time they become Course Directors or Instructor Examiners. I know I had zero interest in either rating, as I was of the opinion that maintaining my and my training agency’s standards without feeling real support from the training agency would lead to mental anguish that I would never be able to reconcile.

So perhaps agency standards aren’t watered down. Perhaps it’s a human factor to take the low road every now and again, until the deviation becomes normal. And if the instructor instructor takes the low road, how does the candidate know the difference? I mean, they KNOW the difference, because they can read it in an instructor manual, but then they look around them and see their CD, their IE, and their fellow candidates taking the low road, you get crap instructors.

I’ve told the story many times. In my wife’s IE, every candidate failed to protect the airway of their victim. Including my wife. I was there, on shore, watching. The small difference was that my wife knew she had failed to protect the victim’s airway, she stopped the rescue, and asked for a do-over. The IE allowed her to continue. Normalization of deviance leads to watered down instruction.