PADI does what it advertises it does rather nicely: teach the world to dive. Most the people that I have met who have taken a PADI course are more than "OK" with it. They enjoyed the experience so much, that they encouraged a loved one to take it as well.
Even if true that's rather meaningless.
I have taught the e-learning classes for SDI and have found the comprehension by the students to be far superior than many of those who suffer through the traditional classes.
100% comprehension of the SDI e-learning means 100% comprehension of maybe 50% of what they should be learning. And I truly resent your gratuitous, "do you still beat your wife?" construct. No one has ever had to "suffer" though my classes ... and even if they did, better to suffer there in class than to suffer later out in the ocean, like the graduates of inadequate courses.
What is at the root of this is a large discrepancy over what many instructors see as "essential" skills. There are a few who would want all divers to come out as DMs or Master Diver caliber students. Never mind that MOST DIVERS do not want to make a career out of diving. They want to plop in the water and see all the pretty fishies. PADI enables that for a LOT of divers. Good for them.
What's wrong with having divers come out at Master Diver caliber? I do that routinely, and it's no big deal. I have no problem with people being trained to do nothing more than, "plop into the water and look a pretty fishes," but those people should not be "certified divers." They should receive some sort of credential that restricts them to diving with leadership personnel and that makes said leadership personnel responsible for their safety and any damage that they do to the environment.
The instructor makes more difference than any other mitigating factor other than student attitude. In fact, I would say that those who say differently have an Anti-PADI agenda (which you have) and are the REAL liars.
The worst NAUI instructor and the worst PADI instructor (assuming both are meeting standards) are turning out about the same product, with a slight edge going to the NAUI Instructor; The best PADI instructor is limited by standards, so the product that the best PADI instructor is permitted to turn out is only slightly better than the product of the worst PADI instructor. The product of the best NAUI Instructor, however, is much better than that of the best PADI instructor because the NAUI system does not have a quality governor built into it. Now ... is what I just said a lie? Is it an anti-PADI agenda item. Or is it just the God's honest truth?
... when you spew your elitism, ... I've seen your students. I would not ever call them DM quality. I think that's just a self perpetuating myth so you sound like you are an uber instructor or something.
What is wrong with striving to be the best possible? What is wrong with aspiring to an elite level rather than a mediocre level? I can't see why someone would want to be an unter instructor, except perhaps an
unterwasser instructor (Tauchleher).
Denial: not just another river in Egypt. Run that by any jury selection lawyer and see how fast they laugh you out of the courtroom. the height of arrogance is to believe that you are IMMUNE to your bias. I have never CLAIMED to know your feelings better than yourself, but no matter how much you protest about it, it's OBVIOUS by your actions that you are decidedly ANTI-PADI. You seem to take every opportunity to decry them and their instructors. You pass off your opinions like they are some kind of gospel. If we don't agree then we are LYING. It IS the instructor, old boy. It's why people sought YOU out as an instructor. They could give a flip about you being a part of the YMCA. People don't seek ME out because of NAUI, SDI or TDI, but because of what I teach them and HOW I teach them.
Your logic is deficient. People seek me out as an instructor because of the job I did for them, or someone they know. I could not do that job within the PADI system. I could do that job within the NAUI system. That's a fact, not a bias.
As it is, you are now a part of the problem. You have squandered away your ability to make a difference by your rancor against the agencies. Sure, you have a small cadre of instructors who somehow feel that Scuba Instruction has gone down hill. Thank God you are the minority! Not so surprisingly, you've successfully marginalized yourselves to the point where those who ARE in a position to make a difference shake their collective heads and smile condescendingly. They know that you just don't "get it".
What ability to make what change? That's complete and utter crap.
Diving instruction, as measured by the capability of the diver completing an entry-level course, has diminished, that's demonstrable by doing nothing more that comparing the standards of today with those of ten, twenty and thirty years ago. The regression line has a definite negative slope.
The only reason that it is a minority of instructors who see that, is that it is a minority of instructors who have been certified for more than two or three years, very few are left who know anything about instruction, student quality or standards ten, twenty or thirty years ago. What has created a situation whereby the newbie instructors can get away with, "shaking their collective heads and smiling condescendingly" is the prevarication amongst some older instructors and fear of not being up on the latest trendy horse pucky amongst other older instructors.
