Trouble in my openwater course

[Kingpatzer]

I am terribly sorry that you've had such a bad experience. While I have no great advice to offer you, I would urge you to report this person to their agency and give them a detailed account of what happened. The lack of professionalism shown (as well as what are likely clear standards violations) should be a concern to any agency.

 

[Kilili]

Put it behind you and for follow-up classes find an instructor that matches your disposition, being sure to lay out your expectations.

My first classes were done by a very seasoned instructor, who cut a lot of corners and did a terrible job. His rationale, as it turned out, is that most students will never go diving again anyway. No wonder!

 

[CamG]

Greetings Kasdeva and welcome to Scuba Board!
Wow it sounds like you have had a bit of a rough start but do not loose heart.
What you seek is out there and I would encourage you to continue your diving and research.
It is a shame that your OW instructor did not embrace your enthusiasm and offer a question and answer time after class.
I remember many such conversations with my mentor and instructor MSDT Mark. WE STILL HAVE THESE TALKS!

Follow your plan and hook up with a dive club and or another LDS instructor who can talk diving with.
Make sure you are diving and building experience safely. Always dive within your training and experience levels and never stop learning!
I have learned volumes on-line, from friends I have met here at SB and on other diving forums.

Your diving future depends on your goals and skill development. Take your time and learn well move at a calculated rate.
Your current understanding of diving physiology and physics will be a great help for you in future courses and or certifications.
Keep your eye's and ears open for a great dive mentor with like goals and values that echo your own. What you will find is that the brotherhood / sisterhood of divers is a bond that can be very close. I have been very lucky to have this with several buddies it is amazing.

The limits are endless and only you determine how far you will go!
I have found myself moving into realms of diving I only dreamed of and loving every minute!
Great to have you aboard and welcome to the diving community!

CamG Keep diving....Keep training....Keep learning!

 

[boulderjohn]

First of all, I agree that standards violations should be reported to the agency.

Next, the unwillingness to deal with your tougher questions, as ZenDiver pointed out, may not be due to the inability of the instructor to handle the question; it may be die to an unwillingness to deal with it in front of the other students. If you are asking advanced questions while they are trying to understand the basic ones, then it would confuse them and make it harder for them to learn. If you were to start asking detailed questions about bubble mechanics in one of my OW classes, I would ask you to wait until we were alone to explore that topic. There are a number of topics I don't discuss in the OW class for that reason.

Finally, the lack general professionalism of your experience would steer me far away from that operator in the future.

 

[jdetmold]

I think I would have asked for my money back when I heard an introduction of "don't ask hard questions"

 

[tonka97]

"Deflate your BCD and go to the bottom.". Being seriously overweighted I plummet to the bottom and hurt my ears trying to equalize,

This is a travesty, and essentially malpractice.

Same thing in my YMCA OW class....an assumption than everyone understood how to protect their ears.

2 students in my class of 7 burst their eardrums, and quit diving.
I hurt mine but not burst, thankfully.

 

[ScubaFeenD]

Look on the bright side, you started diving, you love it, you're probably going to be really good at it. Think of the OW class as just a less-than-ideal beginning.

Don't run off to technical classes yet, just do some diving. You seem like a very self-motivated person and its possible the best teacher for you for a little while might be yourself, or some more experienced dive buddies that can give you some guidance. When you do get a few dives under your belt, the technical/cave instructors in general will tend to have higher standards and stronger dive skills. IN GENERAL, there are lots of exceptions on both sides of the issue.

Its far worse to read about someone who had a hard time with the skills, was uncomfortable in the water, etc...in your case, I can see being annoyed and bored, but at least you're not crying because you couldn't stop a panic attack when you take your mask off.

Have a great time diving!

"Technical diving" is a myth. Understanding physiology, decompression, physics, and mathematics, at a level appropriate to be a competent diver ( a level usually prescribed to be "technical diving") should be for everyone from basic scuba all the way to the most advanced, task loaded diving possible. I applaud the OP for actually wanting to understand the dynamics that are involved in truly gaining control in the water and thoroughly understanding what he/she is undertaking.

While being trained in "technical diving" isn't a pre-req for being an OW instructor it shouldn't be an excuse to be an idiot, and not truly understand what the activity requires when teaching others. Too often mediocre instructors and DMs get away with knowing nothing and still imparting whatever fragments of information they have on students. I am not even referring to the worthless "skills" they possess.

Get your money back. You paid them to be professional and teach you how to SCUBA dive safely and effectively; they didn't hold up their end of the transaction. There is never an excuse for worthless, garbage education

 

[Griff..]

I had a fairly similar thing happen.

I took my open water course when I was on holiday in the Caribbean, Corners were cut, not so good equipment..

I went back to England and did my course again...
turns out they didnt even put my PIC through.. Cause I didn't really know how it worked..
but yeah they didnt even do anything so it was asif the course never happened.

I'm now a Divemaster

 

[Cruisin Home]

Report the instructor to the agency. It is the only way to prevent it from happening again.

 

[Mr Carcharodon]

Report the instructor to the agency. It is the only way to prevent it from happening again.

Sadly except for having too many students on hand for one of the classes the instructor largely met agency standards. The original poster may not know it but the qualifications for instructors has been a common area of complaint on Scubaboard. Many would consider the requirements for becoming an instructor too low in terms of knowledge and experience. And those inexperienced instructors cannot pass along a level of skill or knowledge that they themselves do not possess.

Finding in depth instruction in commercial dive shops is hard since the shops and instructors have to keep the classes short enough that they will make a profit and the cost low enough that the students will pay for it. Longer format classes can often be had through a college, local government or non-profit. The other approach is to seek out other like minded divers to be mentored by. That is often the best approach since it usually takes time and experience just to get to the point of asking the right questions.