Swimming Skills Assessment

[Trace Malinowski]

I have not been attending the same industry meetings as you, but I have heard people say that many of today's divers are not comfortable in the water. In stating this, though, they are not talking about the same thing as you are in this thread. They are talking about comfort in the water as it relates to diving skill, especially safety and buoyancy control.

Skilled swimmers who are completely comfortable in the water before diving but who experience weak instructional practice may be uncomfortable in the water while diving. They may be struggling to swim comfortably because they can't control trim or buoyancy. They may have not have had enough practice with skills like air sharing, checking their gauges, or clearing their masks to feel comfortable performing those skills while diving. That may be especially true if they are diving well up in the water column and have never been taught how to perform those skills in mid water while maintaining buoyancy control.

As I said, I have not been traveling in your circle, but in the circle in which I travel, that is what is meant when they talk about divers not being comfortable in the water.

John, in these meetings at the very mention of training agencies finding a way to improve diver skill, the roadblock to any discussion of how we might be able to arrive at a smarter way to improve diver training is that today's diver just isn't comfortable in the water and therefore isn't willing to work in a scuba class. They'll leave the sport if we do much more than sell them a lifetime certification card. I argue that they are for sure comfortable in the water, just not comfortable with their training as you describe.

I wanted to add another arrow in the quiver for my argument next time I'm in such a meeting. SB helped. It seems that those active or interested enough in diving to join an Internet diving forum assess themselves as quite comfortable. My future argument will be that we need to take that comfort, motivate people to want to meet whatever training standards are set to produce quality divers and the industry needs to retool those standards to take advantage of modern educational opportunities while at the same time finding a better way to train divers to greater skill levels in whatever time frame is reasonable for good instructors to produce quality divers. If in-water time isn't adequate a good instructor can only create a fair student and an excellent instructor can only create a good student. My belief is that it is time we re-examined the way we are training divers and get more agencies to join the 21st century by giving more credit to divers for wanting to excel while finding a better way to help them achieve that goal.

 

[boulderjohn]

John, in these meetings at the very mention of training agencies finding a way to improve diver skill, the roadblock to any discussion of how we might be able to arrive at a smarter way to improve diver training is that today's diver just isn't comfortable in the water and therefore isn't willing to work in a scuba class. They'll leave the sport if we do much more than sell them a lifetime certification card. I argue that they are for sure comfortable in the water, just not comfortable with their training as you describe.

I agree with your general statement, and I believe as a result there is a self-fulfilling prophecy in scuba instruction. If you assume that divers are not comfortable enough in the water to become comfortable with dive skills during OW instruction, then you will not teach them those dive skills as a part of your instruction. Then, when you see they are not comfortable, you can say, "See, I told you."

I know you already know from past conversations where I am going to go with this, but I will summarize for this audience.

If students are instructed to do do all skills in the confined water while firmly planted on their knees on the bottom, if they have minimal opportunity to swim while neutrally buoyant in confined water, if in the open water they also do all skills firmly planted on the bottom, then they they will complete their OW classes without being comfortable in the water.

If, on the other hand, students are never taught those skills on the knees but are instead taught in a prone position while slightly neutral, if they are given significant time to practice neutral swimming in trim, if they are led to perform all later confined water skills in mid water and given adequate practice, and if they are required to do all skills in the OW dives in mid water, then they will complete their training in the same amount of time being comfortable in the water.

So why isn't this being done more? Two reasons:

1. Most instructors have never seen it done this way and don't know that it can be done this way.

2. Having never seen it done, most instructors don't believe divers are comfortable enough in the water to learn to do it this way and so reject this technique based on the prejudice.

 

[boulderjohn]

If in-water time isn't adequate a good instructor can only create a fair student and an excellent instructor can only create a good student.

I mentioned this in my previous response but wanted to emphasize it again:

It is of course true that more time with quality instruction creates better divers. On the other hand, my experience is that you can create a tremendous increase in student skill in the same amount of time if you use a different instructional approach.

 

[fisheater]

Trace:

Maybe it's time to realize BOTH visions that are clashing at these meetings. One being the idea that vacation operators want very low barriers to cranking out "divers" on vacation so as to fill up their cattle boats. The other being that newly-minted divers are too frequently not sufficiently comfortable with their quickly-taught "skills" to undertake independent (i.e. non-DM or Instructor led) local diving and thus drop out.

How about two levels of OW cards? "Vacation Open Water Diver" (or similar) for divers passing the quick, minimal courses now offered at destination resorts and "Full Open Water" (or similar) for divers passing a more rigorous course, aimed at producing confident divers who can plan and execute dives without reliance on DMs or Instructors. Vacation Divers would be limited to DM/Instructor- led dives and their card wouldn't BR sufficient to get fills independent of a DM or Instructor.


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[smurf doc]

........How about two levels of OW cards? "Vacation Open Water Diver" (or similar) for divers passing the quick, minimal courses now offered at destination resorts and "Full Open Water" (or similar) for divers passing a more rigorous course, aimed at producing confident divers who can plan and execute dives without reliance on DMs or Instructors. Vacation Divers would be limited to DM/Instructor- led dives and their card wouldn't BR sufficient to get fills independent of a DM or Instructor.


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Doesn't this already exist with with PADI Scuba Diver vs Open Water Diver?

Also if they are taught the same stuff, who's to say a diver graduating from a resort course is less confident than one graduating from a non-resort course? That's an individual assessment thing, and in my opinion a critical part of being a diver. Everyone on this board is always stressing don't do anything you are not comfortable with and trained for. Amplify this simple message, don't downplay it.

I got my PADI OW certification at the end of February. I plan to dive in May while on a cruise. I made sure to pick places I would be comfortable with, and have even taken the step of double checking with my instructor who has dived many more places than I have. She can provide a more objective assessment of my readiness because she assessed my open water skills during the checkout dives and then again recently in the pool. Perhaps ask newly certified divers (say those with less than 10 dives) or those who haven't dove in a while to do something similar -- go to the pool of a LDS and have your skills reevaluated. Then if you have the instructor's blessing you get a little certificate you can take with you if the DM wants evidence.Ad

Just my two cents.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Trace:

Maybe it's time to realize BOTH visions that are clashing at these meetings. One being the idea that vacation operators want very low barriers to cranking out "divers" on vacation so as to fill up their cattle boats. The other being that newly-minted divers are too frequently not sufficiently comfortable with their quickly-taught "skills" to undertake independent (i.e. non-DM or Instructor led) local diving and thus drop out.

How about two levels of OW cards? "Vacation Open Water Diver" (or similar) for divers passing the quick, minimal courses now offered at destination resorts and "Full Open Water" (or similar) for divers passing a more rigorous course, aimed at producing confident divers who can plan and execute dives without reliance on DMs or Instructors. Vacation Divers would be limited to DM/Instructor- led dives and their card wouldn't BR sufficient to get fills independent of a DM or Instructor.


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Actually, Fish, this seems an appropriate place for me to address that issue. I pondered this at length over time as we all battled over the training issue on ScubaBoard ...

I do have a new perspective to offer: Training agencies do a very poor job of addressing their training philosophies to prospective divers. There is an approach for everyone that can lead to safe diving. That's the heart and soul of diver training that gets lost in marketing for profit.

 

[Frosty]

Hey guys clearly I'm no dive training expert.
Given that the instructor is argueably playing with peoples lives Wouldn't it be apropriate for Padi and its competitors to have random quality checks done on Scuba schools?
Kinda a "mystery shopper"
Clearly an instructor that is failing to demonstrate basic skills should be suspended till they can show proper dive skills again
On the same subject shouldn't divers and instructors require regular "licence" checks to ensure they are staying safe with their diving-and as a result passing these standards on to their students/buddies ?

 

[50Fathom]

Clearly an instructor that is failing to demonstrate basic skills should be suspended till they can show proper dive skills again

The rub is, the existing "standard" for the skills is so low as to be a limbo bar, so even if they meet the agency's standards, they're still turning out marginal divers.

It's usually when the instructor goes beyond the standard and demands true excellence, then they can turn out good divers. (AKA, a good, conscientious instructor, not a "C-card mill instructor" cranking 'em out as fast as possible.)

Not all instructors do this, and not all agencies require it. That's why it's best to try and "feel out" a prospective instructor beforehand, and see if they are a good match for what you want out of diving instruction.

 

[cbm32]

I am comfortable in the water. I am comfortable in a wide variety of training situations (thinking of a wide variety of subjects and not just scuba). I am not, however, completely comfortable with the cost of some training/courses.

Not saying that instructors dont deserve to be paid or that they make too much necessarily. Just that cost will play a factor in when/how much training I sign up for.

 

[Diver0001]

John, in these meetings at the very mention of training agencies finding a way to improve diver skill, the roadblock to any discussion of how we might be able to arrive at a smarter way to improve diver training is that today's diver just isn't comfortable in the water and therefore isn't willing to work in a scuba class. They'll leave the sport if we do much more than sell them a lifetime certification card. I argue that they are for sure comfortable in the water, just not comfortable with their training as you describe.

What are these opinions based upon? Is there some research you can cite that shows that "divers are not comfortable in the water"? That just seems like an impossibly big generalization to be making about "divers".

The thing is, I have trouble believing this because if I look around me and see the divers *I* encounter then I would say, in fact, that the vast majority of them *are* comfortable in the water. I can't seem to make the connection to how you reached the exact opposite conclusion.

Clearsly, there will always be some divers/students who are not comfortable even after the OW course ends and I believe that inadequate training has something to do with that. However, the main problem I see isn't even so much the course format or the standards, which are just a list of things they need to be able to do, but the mere and simple fact that not enough instructors say "no". No to their employers whose interest isn't always in delivering a quality product, and "no" to students who are on time schedules but are unable to achieve the standard in the time typically alloted for it.

You seem to want to approach it as an issue with standards but there are some things you and your colleagues are missing here:

1) Standards, no matter how high they are set, will not necessarily lead to a quality delivery if the instructor is not in a position (due to time, pressures, lack of ability etc etc) to deliver that quality where the rubber meets the road. Every process manager in the world (project managers, engineers, teachers .... etc etc) will tell you that process adherence is only a small part of delivering quality and in most cases not even *close* to being the most important driver of product quality.

2) There seems to be a massive disconnect on the WRSTC level with respect to making assumptions about what people want without testing those assumptions via quality marketing research. If standards are being set (and then lowered) based on "intuitions" and "assumptions" then there is a lack of professionalism at the top that is completely unacceptable. If you want to improve training, then I would start here by allocating a budget to ongoing marketing research and by making it a requirement for WRSTC board members to also be active instructors. The disconnect with what's happening on the ground has to be dealt with.

My belief is that it is time we re-examined the way we are training divers and get more agencies to join the 21st century by giving more credit to divers for wanting to excel while finding a better way to help them achieve that goal.

I like this ambition a LOT but let's say for a moment that you're right and that cost and "instant gratification" are the main barriers stopping people from getting into the sport. How would you change things without driving up costs and/or delaying gratification?

Isn't this the main issue? Lowering the bar makes it easier for people to make the decision to try it, and evidently increases revenue across the board even though retention goes down and we know that people who take con-ed courses end up spending a lot more money on scuba diving.

Thinking about it like this, from a purely profit based point of view, it doesn't seem to matter at all that some people are unconfortable in the water... as long as they tried it and paid. I'm not saying that this is right, but it does seem to be how the WRSTC is looking at it.

R..