What to do with scary adult divers whose children are better trained?

[Jim Lapenta]

Thal has a point. Do you consider yourself to be an educator? If not, why not? We are passing on info to these kids that will enable them to place themselves and allow their parents to place them at considerable risk. If you are conveying to them the rules that will keep them safe and they ( the parents) refuse to obey them it;s one thing. But you sound as if you are genuinely concerned for this child's safety. If this is the case and you really believe that he is at risk of serious injury or worse, then speaking only for myself I would contact the appropriate authorites even just for general info. I take teaching kids very seriously. To my knowledge I'm the only instructor in my area who has bothered to go through the background checks to get PA State Police Clearance for working with children. As a result I also got alot of info as to what my responsibilities are when working with kids and getting paid to do so. Just as a schoolteacher, camp counselor, scout leader, etc is required to report when they feel a child is in real danger, I am as well. In addition my own morals and ethics would require me to do so.

So the question is- Do you really feel that these parents are endagering their son with their practices and if so can your conscience allow them to continue? And if something should happen to him as a result of this how will you answer the questions that will be sure to come from someone? Maybe from your own students who saw what trainwrecks these people were? Perhaps from someone with the authority to ask why after observing this behavior you did nothing other than talk to the pigheaded parents? Alot of kids have died because all someone did was talk unofficially to the parents who caused or contributed to the death.

Maybe I take things too seriously? Some think I do especially when it comes to safety and safe diving practices. That this sport is not as dangerous as I try to convey it is. Too bad. I wil not compromise my beliefs, morals, ethics, and training practices just to make a buck. I'd rather lose 1000 student tuitions than have 1 get injured or killed because I compromised one of those areas.

 

[Tigerman]

...
Maybe I take things too seriously? Some think I do especially when it comes to safety and safe diving practices. That this sport is not as dangerous as I try to convey it is. Too bad. I wil not compromise my beliefs, morals, ethics, and training practices just to make a buck.
...

Theire half right.. Scuba isnt as dangerous as conveyed.

...provided you follow the safety measures suggested and dont take unneccesary risks..

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Exactly. And I qualify that in my classes. If you follow your training and dive within it and your experience level it is very safe. Go outside of those parameters too far and too fast without proper preparation, training, and experience, it can hurt or kill you very quickly in some very nasty ways. I open every class with this statement regardless of level.

 

[robint]

this is a sad situation but I have seen it happen myself. Some parents just don't deserve to be parents. You can't do much about it unless it happens right in front of you. Even then, it can get ugly... I got into an nasty argument with a parent once when I suggested she needed to back off and consider her child's safety. Darwin at work, but no way I could protect the child from what his parents had planned for him on vacation (much like you described). They didn't care, said it was none of my business, and I could do nothing about it.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

He wasnt gifted anything, he passed his certification course as did several others within his class. In fact, where tougher on younger divers and are very strict. 50% of the time we reccommend scuba rangers or additional training if we see any hesitation or potential problems. We do quarry diving in our area and generally recommend younger divers to get more dives under their belts for nothing more than gaining experience. The ocean is a bit more unforgiving than limited depth quarries.

If the boy truly did pass the requirements of certification there should be no problem making his very next dive in the Ocean; at an appropriate dive site in good conditions with a competent instructor/guide. But instead you just say no, which we all know works so well. With what you say of the parents, 20 dives with them in quarry conditions is not going to make the transition to Ocean much better.

 

[joolz]

My question for my fellow scuba boarders is: What would you do, or how would you address this situation?

This doesn't help you in this particular situation because the cert has already been issued, but my shop's policy is that we won't certify a 12 year old as a Jr OW diver even though he meets the minimum age requirements. Instead, we certify them as Jr Scuba Divers so we know that at least they'll be supervised by someone other than their parents. Once they turn 15, we'll give them the option to upgrade to OW.

While they may just move on to another shop, we explain that it's primarily about safety -- both theirs and their kid's. Most 12 year olds don't have the physical strength or emotional maturity to handle an in-water rescue scenario involving a parent. Many parents seem to come around when we put it in those terms.

 

[GrandpaScuba]

As they say... there is no Scuba Police. You can't really control them after they are certified. SSI standards say that Jr. OWD between 12 and 14 are not to dive deeper than 60ft. And must dive with a certified adult. This should have been emphasized during the course.

I would call the Certifications Desk at SSI and explain the issue and ask them if there is any action you should take when you know that an SSI Jr. OWD is not following this standard. You may want to document this situation, some how, to protect yourself from the inevitable lawsuit that will result when these people kill themselves.

 

[pengwe]

I don't know if you will see this kid, but if you do, you could have a chat to him about safety. You are his instructor, so I think you have a right to talk to him about it. He is only a kid, but 12 is still old enough to take some responsibility and develop some common sense about his actions. You don't need to criticize his parents, and just talk to him about what the risks are, and how he himself can do better at managing them. He can stay close to the dive guide, he can call dives he's not comfortable with (by saying he can't clear his ears, or he's tired, or he just doesn't want to), he can ask for shallower sites (the fish life is usually better shallow). Of course he has just been following his parents lead and it wouldn't occur to him to do otherwise, but if they are not looking out for his safety then someone has to, and maybe he has to do it for himself. It's not really ideal but it's the best I can think of, since his parents probably aren't going to change.

 

[sohnje]

I think were going to consider not training younger students unless their parents were trained by us so we could avoid or rather limit this situation from happening again. Or maybe require the parents be involved always in the open water class so they can be evaluated. As said, I cant fix stupid, but I could be sure that stupid doesnt put a child at risk.

So I learned..there are no scuba police: You cant revoke a junior cert because the parents are brain dead: and parents should need to pass a licensing exam before allowed to procreate.

BTW...I'm stealng this line...."Most 12 year olds don't have the physical strength or emotional maturity to handle an in-water rescue scenario involving a parent."

 

[cloudswinger]

Although he is now his parents repsonsibilty, and I made my self very clear how they have violated just about every safety rule we teach, (I would not permit them to dive with our group again until they complete a refresher/saftey course), they just answered that I was just being overprotective and that is why her husband wanted to do a PADI course rather than an SSI. Now I dont care who is the certifying agency is, but there must be some common sense used by parents.

If some parents had common sense, they wouldn't be parents in the first place. And your first statement is correct, he is his parents reponsibility. And if he has idiots for parent, well, there really isn't much you can do about it. People let 12 or 14 year olds drive all the time, even though it's not safe and illegal. And that's giving a kid a 2 ton device perfectly capable of killing someone else.

I think that maybe a different approach to the safety warnings would have been better appreciated by the parents. Sometimes things said one way is ignored, while another person saying the same thing in a different way gets the message through.