What is Avanced Buoyancy Class?

[serambin]

The buoyancy topic taught in OW isn't enough?

Anyone with a Chesterton quote is good by me.

 

[serambin]

I don't think anyone objects to the class filling the need. I think the objection is to the OW class that doesn't teach the things it should in the first place. The "need" shouldn't exist. When an OW class is designed to have a flaw that will be fixed by another class later, that's a problem that should be addressed or is it merely a good marketing plan taking precedence over training?

BC was one of the most important things I learned in OW. Test after test, and if you failed, more work.

Stan

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

This is SUCH a misnomer. DIRF is 3-4 dives. For many students, another 10 dives beyond that begins to show marked improvement. I know that 3 dives after Fundies, I was FAR better in the water. What's wrong with having BOW be 8 dives? And for the record, pivoting on a dime with hands clasped in front is not NEARLY as hard as it looks. If your buoycancy is reasonable, it's child's play.

Perhaps I'm a slow learner, but it took far more than 3 dives for me to show marked improvement after Fundies. In fact, it took more than 3 dives for me to get over the point where I wanted to burn my dive gear and take up a different recreational activity.

Most folks I know who got a "provisional" from Fundies weren't up to "passing" skills for at least 15 or 20 dives ... some much more than that. I was one of the latter group.

Buoyancy control is a very subjective term ... I think I've got pretty decent skills, but anytime I go diving with Uncle Pug or some of my other dive buddies I'll still end the dive thinking my buoyancy control sucks.

It's like the old Les McCann tune ... "Compared to what?"

... Bob (Grateful diver)

 

[MikeFerrara]

you would *think* that simple self-preservation would have you, when
facing the possibility of surviving on life-support underwater, opt for the
more comprehensive and longer instruction option, wouldn't you?

i mean, if someone said to you, here's this bomb in your back yard, no
one can dismantle it for you (some weird law) but i can teach you how to
dismantle it yourself one of two ways:

1. in a weekend for $99; or

2. during three weeks for $350

which one would you really chose?

This isn't a good analogy though. Most people would assume that disarming a bomb is potentially dangerous.

The dive industry has done lots of marketing to comvince people that diving isn';t dangerous at all. We tell them it's as safe as bowling and thet they can even take their 10 year old kids with them.

Agencies like PADI, have the "dive today" methodology. They encourage instructors to get people out on a dive before any class at all.

Current marketing also addresses time and cost. The industry wants to appeal itseld to busy people who have lots of different interests so we want them to believe that it's quick and inexpensive. Well, getting a card is quick and inexpensive.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I agree with the many points in the overall trend of this thread, but I do have some observations.

The entire concept of a Basic OW class is that you learn the basics of scuba diving. As another in thread pointed out, you learn by doing. Take this quote, from boulderjohn above:

"about 20 dives after you think you have mastered it, you realize you still suck."

I agree with this. But when you combine the two subjects being bantered about by the wizened diving experts in this thread... how long do you people expect a BASIC open water class to last?!? 5 dives? 20 dives? 40? 200? All in name of achieving perfect buoyancy control? It certainly makes you a better diver, but seriously, how many people are going to dive with the bar set THAT high? When are they to be allowed to learn on their own make their own mistakes? I agree some might get themselves into trouble, but my personal opinion is that anyone who wants to play Darwin's Little Helper and go for the advanced dives in poor conditions without being prepared deserves what they get. Even a crappy, read-from-a-card-and-never-deviate-the-script PADI B.O.W. course should give the new diver some clue that this ain't something to mess around with lightly.

Now, don't get me wrong. I agree that perhaps more time should be spent teaching (and being sure that the student learned well) good, basic buoyancy skills. But how much time is too much time? Where do you draw the line? I'm certainly not advocating the $99 one-day cert course. But I also can't advocate the 6 months of drilling it might take (or more!) to truly produce a DIR-F level diver who can pivot on a dime with his/her hands clasped in front.

IME, part of the problem is in "what" is taught and "how" it's taught. Most entry level courses don't teach divers the tools they need to improve on and that's why it takes divers so many dives to show improvement if they ever do at all...and many don't.

In theory many classes are designed to be performance based, meaning that the student stays until they meet the opbjectives. However, in order to keep the class short they address the time issue by having low objectives.

I arguie that much more can be accomplished in the same amount of time and with a little extra time MUCH more can be accomplished. My classes were about 9 hours in the classroom, 15 hours in the pool and 4 open water dives and I was comfortable diving with the students I certified...or having them dive with eachother. The class was a little longer than most but it was also a lot different. Just adding more time to practice isn't enough. They need to be taught what to practice.

So where should the bar be set? And further, what makes you think you have the right to determine that level? Opinions are like elbows, blah blah blah. If you're an instructor, perhaps you can set the level for YOUR students. Otherwise, there just ain't that much we can do about it. Further, I question just how much we SHOULD do about it.

I set the bar at what I though the minimum skill level chould be and all very basic. Of course there are people who disagree with where I set it.

As far as the industry as a whole...if the consumer is happy we shouldn't do anything...except to enforce whatever consumer protection laws already exist and to maybe keep on eye on conservation comcerns...and MANY divers are murder on the diving environment.

The bar has been set. Is it too low? Arguably, yes. So you have four basic choices. 1) Write PADI, NAUI, SSA, SDI, etc. and give 'em an earful, and hope they act on it. 2) Become an instructor and train 'em yourself, to your standards. 3) Let it go. 4) Gripe about it here on SB.

It's generally clear which choices most have made...

I've done all of the above.

 

[H2Andy]

This isn't a good analogy though. Most people would assume
that disarming a bomb is potentially dangerous.

true, true ... but still, no amount of marketing can convince me that going
under water on life-support is not potentially dangerous

i mean... are we that easily duped?

 

[H2Andy]

Perhaps I'm a slow learner, but it took far more than 3 dives for me to show marked improvement after Fundies.

when i took cavern (the first time i was introduced to the horizontal, fins up
position) it was hopeless. i couldn't believe i had passed the class, because
my trim and bouyancy were a disaster.

it took me close to 10 dives (i am going from memory, logbook is at home)
before things "clicked." i don't mean before i "got it" but before things sort
of clicked and i knew what i was shooting for, and could do it for portions of
the dive.

it probalby took another 15-20 dives before i could maintain the position consistently.

by the time i took Intro. to Cave, it was dialed in and it was a matter of not
losing it when task-loaded. i'm still working on that.

so.... this stuff takes a while to get, in my experience

i took DIR-F in between Cavern and Intro. Cave. the 3-4 days were
invaluable in showing me what i needed to do, not in getting my skills
"perfect." DIR-F is more like a diagnostic and you get a list of things
you need to work on. then you go work on them.

it's not a magic class that suddenly makes you a great diver in 4 dives,
nor does it claim to.

 

[PerroneFord]

Hmmm ok. I don't see myself as a fast learner at all. I guess I still just suck in the water!

I'll just go dive with H2Andy. He'll tell me I suck in the water.

 

[H2Andy]

we all suck in the water, to different degrees

basically, if you can do it safely and have fun, that's good enough for me

 

[TSandM]

First off, I want to speak up for the "uneducated consumer". When I decided to learn to dive, I didn't get on the internet and do a bunch of research to find out whether scuba instruction was what it should be or not. Why would I? It seemed (and still seems) a reasonable assumption that a shop which had been in business for some time, and ran classes regularly, through a world-wide agency, would teach a solid class. And you know what? The shop I went through DID teach a solid class, by the standards I've come to know. We had six classroom sessions and nine hours in the pool, and the usual four open water dives. At the end of all of it, I knew what neutral buoyancy was but I don't think I'd ever achieved it for more than a moment at a time. I knew I wasn't supposed to dive feet low and kick the anemones, because my instructor had hassled me about doing it, but I had no idea how NOT to do it.

I took the Peak Performance Buoyancy class because I knew my buoyancy control sucked and the anemones feared me, and it didn't help much except to get my general weighting correct.

It wasn't until I met Bob and watched him dive that I started to figure out that he dove with a completely different position in the water. I watched him sit motionless to look at things and I decided I wanted to learn how to dive like that. Shortly before that, I had found SB and started reading, and that led to other sites and other articles, and before you knew it, I was really working on buoyancy and trim.

And then I took Fundies and found out how high the bar could be raised. I'm one of those people who has taken the WHOLE six months to bring my skills up to passing standard, but I'm pathetically grateful for having had to do it, because I enjoy my diving so much more as a result.

Advanced buoyancy class? Anybody who got the training I got should take one, and with any luck, it would be a good one and a thorough one, and leave the student knowing just what to practice and with a good mental image of what he is trying to achieve.