New Scuba Diving Instructors

Hear Ye, Hear Ye, Hear Ye!  Let it be known that Oceanic Ventures Has Four New Scuba Diving Instructors!

After a lot of time listening to lectures, working through a mound of homework, having special sessions, apprenticing with the staff and a great deal of stressful studying, John Davis, Joe Henry, Joel Hershey and Scuba Steve Soulen completed their Instructor Evaluation Clinic, IEC, this past weekend and are now officially Open Water Scuba Diving Instructors — well ok, once the paperwork is processed at SSI headquarters.  Their journey to this point has been a long winding road.  There were a lot of classroom sessions with me as well as pool classes and open water sessions.  During the process, they all became Dry Suit divers so they could stand the winter and early spring waters at the lake and they learned to work with troublesome students (thank you Alex Witschey and Madison Lee.)  They worked with new students and divers wanting to join Neptune again (i.e. Scuba Skills Updates).  They plowed through standards and textbooks looking for the gems that they would be tested over as well as their Science of Diving materials (the physics and physiology of diving.)
Throughout the process they maintained a positive attitude and stepped-in to help where ever they could.  Along the way, they, along with Dive Coordinator, Susan Long, came up with some awesome marketing ideas and some ways to improve the diving programs at Oceanic Ventures. All the while, Dive Mom had to remain out of their training and could not help them through the training process.  However, I think the preparation program was just as hard for Dive Mom, because she could not participate in the program nor assist them in any way.  She had to maintain her distance since she was the Instructor Certifier for the IEC.
In the end they all shined!  They completed the testing and evaluation with most of their finger nails intact and with hair on their head — well, Joel excluded.  AT about 4:30 Sunday afternoon they all knew — They passed and were now finished with their Instructor program!