Why do so many poorly skilled divers...

[Al Mialkovsky]

Ummm 30 years ago my open water class was more complete than many instructor candidate classes are these days. Well, it was 42 years ago, maybe that's why?

But these days I'm an instructor so it has to be better right?????

 

[Stu S.]

In support of Stu... Training is better than it was 30 years ago... but worse than it was 10 years ago. Still, it is better than it was 30 years ago... Such are the ups and downs of a still budding sport (or hobby) as some would call it. And Stu... I don't know if you know this or not but Joe's brother Harry passed away a couple of months ago. I didn't know Harry that well... but he was a nice man and he will be missed as well... Happy Diving!

That was a great family operation. I can still recall 1PM, July 31 1982. My brother and I were wearing suits, and I was buying a depth guage from Joe's mom. Mom asked why we were dressed up, and I told her I had to be in Towson at 2PM to get married, and the bro was my best man. She was genuinely happy for me, and off we went.

I believe Harry was unable to dive due to some physical problems. I recall him as the repairman.

Anyhow, NASDS started training using Betamax VCR tapes, and me and some friends were among the first to take it. There were about a dozen tapes. Nobody could afford a VCR at home, so we watched them in the store. The system allowed the instructor to work the store while we trained. This was at the old Scuba Hut in Glen Burnie.

Well, sometimes during the tapes the instructor would pipe up "don't listen to this part... it is wrong", or "don't do it that way". The concept was obviously not perfected. Chaz trained my brother in Parkville, and he got better teaching without tapes.

Well buddy, I miss Baltimore, but I left when manufacturing moved out. At least around here we can dive year round. I took the kid for some 72 degree spring diving today, and Sunday we will go with my pals down to Jupiter.

Stu S.

 

[Thalassamania]

Purdu University requires a graduate degree to teach anything including scuba. Obviously the grad degree isn't going to be in diving so I'm not sure that I see the sense in it.

The idea is that with a Grad degree you've likely taught at the university level (as a T.A. at least) and you understand how it all works. Diving can be taught at many levels; including one that places rather rigorous demands on the students' knowledge of physics, anatomy, physiology, oceanography, biology, calculus and statistics.

Ummm 30 years ago my open water class was more complete than many instructor candidate classes are these days. Well, it was 42 years ago, maybe that's why?

But these days I'm an instructor so it has to be better right?????

Has to be right.

Hey, Thal. I'll try. I still have my NASDS Safe Scuba Diver card. That course was the only training available, to me anyway. It was basic, AOW and everything else there was. After that, a person seeking more training had to teach themselves, or learn from others. Today we joke about the fifteen different PADI adventure cards. That is still a lot better than nothing.

A lot of our training was physical-fitness related. Over at the YMCA, my pal Whitey spent more time swimmimg laps than he sat in a classroom, getting instructon. The idea was physical fitness was the key to dive safety. I still kind of agree, but what he got was mostly not scuba instruction.

I don't agree, while better fitness will make for a better diver there's not enough time in a class to actually effect someone's level of conditioning. You can teach them the importance of fitness, and how to improve it, and demonstrate how far out of shape they are, and give them a target to reach, but that's about it.

And... I still have a 1977 Skin Diver magazine where a person writes that "My instructor taught us fifteen ways to die under water, but no ways to have fun". That was my experience, too. My training was not particularly fun, it was rather military-style. Two years ago my daughter finished up the PADI CD and on-line training, and it was a lot more positive.

I'm sure it was more positive, but draconically abbreviated. Neither is a good solution in my view.

The biggest improvement I see is that training is more uniform. Maybe uniformly mediocre, but at least the same all over. I took the NASDS class from an instructor in South Baltimore, and my brother took the same thing from a guy on the other side of town. We shared our notes and found that each of us had learned things that the other hadn't.

Why is it better to have everything reduced to the least common denominator? As Emerson noted, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."

So, are there divers being certified today that would fail the training I took? You bet. We were all young and swam a lot, anyway. In that regard, maybe the old timey certification is better, if harder = better. However, the content of course materials and the number of subjects available are superior today.

Thanks for asking, and Merry Christmas.

I would not see failing your earlier course as a measure of anything at all. It would be a prime example of the basic tenet of instruction, "Just because you think that you've taught does not mean that they have learned."

... Anyhow, NASDS started training using Betamax VCR tapes, and me and some friends were among the first to take it. There were about a dozen tapes. Nobody could afford a VCR at home, so we watched them in the store. The system allowed the instructor to work the store while we trained. This was at the old Scuba Hut in Glen Burnie.

Well, sometimes during the tapes the instructor would pipe up "don't listen to this part... it is wrong", or "don't do it that way". The concept was obviously not perfected. Chaz trained my brother in Parkville, and he got better teaching without tapes.

Stu S.

Now I understand your comment, the training that you had 30 years ago (NASDS) was hardly the norm, in fact it was widely disparaged by the majority of instructors; especially the tapes, which were awful. With all due respect for both your right to have an opinion, and for the experience that you went through, I must respectful submit that perhaps you might rethink your generalizations as to what diving instruction was like 30 years ago, or how it compares to diving instruction that is being currently offered. There are more than a few folks who were there at time that participate in the SCUBABOARD.

Merry Christmas and I wish you the best possible New Year.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I've only been diving since the 80's but I didn't have any training them. I didn't take classes until the 90's and training has gotten "worse" since them...I don't really care though.

If we're seeing DM's or instructors who have poor basic dive skills the fact is that they either aren't being taught dive skills or they aren't being tested on them.

In early dive training, there weren't any BC's so if you weren't swimming you probably had to be on the bottom. Diving is still taught the same way. It's taught as if the BC were just invented and hasn't been fully integrated into training yet with kneeling being the core skill rather than controling position and movement in the water column.

Most rec agencies teach and test this way all the way up to and including professional level courses and they are taught to teach this way. If you simply read through the standards of each required course, you will see that there is absolutely no reason to expect a DM to be much of a diver midwater.

 

[Stu S.]

Hey Thal. Just passing along what we did at the time. The class took about 10 weeks. All that swimming may have been based upon the "Navy way" of doing things. It was supposed to be good for us, anyhow. My pals at the Naval Academy had a dive club, and although recreational diving, did a lot more swimmimg than us. I recall somebody referring to their instructor as an "Old Iron-ass". One of their graduates was a man I went diving with often in Maryland.

Besides the tapes, our instructor told a lot of sea stories, and although it was kind of neat, it had little to do with the subject matter of the day. Much about the history of diving, and the history of the bends was nice to know, but was not about how to dive.

A bit of opinion:

The 2005 training that my kid took seemed more focused on an end objective, rather than a load of "good to know" stuff. The self-paced learning looked a lot like the training that industry and government now use (yes the modern Navy), and we find it effective.

The dive training community must be thanked. It has kept things safe enough that government regulation never came to the sport. I recall visiting Florida and finding that Ginnie Springs was closed due to fatalities. Many of us figured that some government types were about to step in and regulate diving, kind of like flying an airplane. Training in rescue and cavern / cave are examples of the response the diving community to solving it's own problems.

So thanks, and Merry Christmas.

Stu

 

[Thalassamania]

Hey Thal. Just passing along what we did at the time. The class took about 10 weeks. All that swimming may have been based upon the "Navy way" of doing things. It was supposed to be good for us, anyhow. My pals at the Naval Academy had a dive club, and although recreational diving, did a lot more swimmimg than us. I recall somebody referring to their instructor as an "Old Iron-ass". One of their graduates was a man I went diving with often in Maryland.

Besides the tapes, our instructor told a lot of sea stories, and although it was kind of neat, it had little to do with the subject matter of the day. Much about the history of diving, and the history of the bends was nice to know, but was not about how to dive.

A bit of opinion:

The 2005 training that my kid took seemed more focused on an end objective, rather than a load of "good to know" stuff. The self-paced learning looked a lot like the training that industry and government now use (yes the modern Navy), and we find it effective.

The dive training community must be thanked. It has kept things safe enough that government regulation never came to the sport. I recall visiting Florida and finding that Ginnie Springs was closed due to fatalities. Many of us figured that some government types were about to step in and regulate diving, kind of like flying an airplane. Training in rescue and cavern / cave are examples of the response the diving community to solving it's own problems.

So thanks, and Merry Christmas.

Stu

While there is no doubt that cavern/cave training has improved in the last 30 years (it actually exists now, it was a rare commodity way-back-when) your example of rescue (which 30 years ago was a normal part of every class) runs counter to your conclusion.

 

[MikeFerrara]

The dive training community must be thanked. It has kept things safe enough that government regulation never came to the sport.

That's what the dive industry claims anyway. I don't see any data that really quantifies the effect of industry training on safety one way or the other. I certainly don't see any reason to believe that the US government would step in regardless. Lots of people get hurt swimming and mountain biking but the government does not step in.

On the other hand, the governments of some other countries as well as individual jurisdictions here in the U.S. HAVE stepped in to regulate diving.

I recall visiting Florida and finding that Ginnie Springs was closed due to fatalities. Many of us figured that some government types were about to step in and regulate diving, kind of like flying an airplane. Training in rescue and cavern / cave are examples of the response the diving community to solving it's own problems.

I do worry about losing access to caves that can only be accessed through state or city parks. If the diving gets to be too much trouble all they need to do is post no-diving signs.

Ginnie can be accessed from the river but most access it by way of the privately owned dive park. Additionally, they advertise it as an "open water diver safe" cavern which is contrary to most training and open water divers do get hurt there.

 

[PhilEllis]

In 2003, Leisure Trends did a market research study on interest in scuba diving in the general public. In the course of that study, they obviously discovered some subgroup of all of the study panel that were already scuba divers. Of those people that identified themselves as scuba divers, they attempted to identify the "active participants", or those that had been scuba diving at least once in the past year.

They asked these "active scuba divers" which certification agency they trained through. The answer is very instructive..............

A full 59.9% of "active scuba divers" in the Leisure Trends survey ARE NOT certified by a scuba certification agency! That mirrors the statistics of the walk-in customers in my store. Many of them dive weekly, but have never taken a scuba certification class.

Phil Ellis

 

[MikeFerrara]

In 2003, Leisure Trends did a market research study on interest in scuba diving in the general public. In the course of that study, they obviously discovered some subgroup of all of the study panel that were already scuba divers. Of those people that identified themselves as scuba divers, they attempted to identify the "active participants", or those that had been scuba diving at least once in the past year.

They asked these "active scuba divers" which certification agency they trained through. The answer is very instructive..............

A full 59.9% of "active scuba divers" in the Leisure Trends survey ARE NOT certified by a scuba certification agency! That mirrors the statistics of the walk-in customers in my store. Many of them dive weekly, but have never taken a scuba certification class.

Phil Ellis

I'd be real interested in seeing how they sampled their data and exactly what data they actually collected. For example, did they get a bunch of "discover scuba diving" or resort course participants who had dived in the past year but did so under supervision yet were not certified?

 

[Stu S.]

OK guys, I just happened upon a rescue class in progress up at Blue Springs, and the emergency response aspects of it appeared very useful.

As a customer, my perspective is that dive training has moved forward, that's all. It looks like there is more and better training. As people in that trade, if you say it has declined rather than advanced, l believe you.

Engineering, Medicine, and Agriculture have made great advances over the last 30 years. A few occupations produced better work years ago, so if dive training is one of them, that's good to know.

Merry Christmas,

Stu.