Education is a fundamental part of everyday life for humans to progress and evovle, and for divers it's an evolving process that never stops regardless of what level of diving is being attempted.

Technical diver education is an important tool, so much so as dive gear that is being used; and an intrinsic skill that should not be overlooked.

But is there enough educational material to support the learning curve that the divers go through these days?

Are training agencies keeping up with modern tech diver demands? And most importantly, are the people who teach tech courses up to speed and experienced enough to qualify to be teaching the right way?

Internet and other communication tools have opened a whole new world to us; information has become available at a stroke of a keyboard. From an educational stand point, the educational material may not meet a level of quality that is good or useful. In fact it’s getting harder every day to filter through the plethora of information to reach useful, quality educational information. None the less, the internet remains an important medium for divers to access vital educational material, and keeping up with the latest developments from around the world.

Divers, as with the rest of the population, flock to the internet as their first point of call in researching dive topics of interest, followed by other methods such as diving instructors / operators.

The danger here is the quality of information that the diver has access to. There is probably no worst place to be misled by false information leading to doing something that will get an unsuspecting or ‘uneducated’ diver hurt. So again, how do you know whom to trust?

Well this may not be an easy question to answer, but one method is to do a background check on a person or a group, and funny enough the internet is your friend in this situation. It’s possible to Google just about anything these days, and it’s probably the quickest way to check on a group or a person. Of course this will not always going to work, so it pays to be cautious of information you garnish or listen to in diving forums and other online community groups.

But why are we concentrating so much on the internet anyway? Why not make the first stop at your local dive shop? After all they are the people who taught you how to dive and, in my opinion, progress your diving.

When looking for a good dive instructor, there will always be the ‘quality of instructor/instruction’ issue – use common sense and ask around. Ask divers who they trained through, the experience they had and the education they received; because this will determine your future learning and progression.

When looking for an instructor to take expand your diving, the internet comes handy by providing a forum to ask wider diving community for recommendations. It’s important to do your research as much as possible before deciding to sign up for a course and hand over your hard earned cash.

A lot of instructors will be qualified to progress you through most of your tech courses, unless you are after a specialised course -  such as a rebreather course. So it’s good to keep that relationship going because he or she will know your skills and will strive to constantly to help you to improve them.

At some point in time though, your diving may take another turn and you find yourself moving into specialised diving areas, such as diving to depths beyond the 99m mark. This then becomes tricky because when diving goes beyond what any training agency teaches, you are then on your own.

Taking deep diving as an example, most training agencies will teach Trimix diving to 99 metres, with some agencies just below 100 metres. So when we start venturing below these limits we enter a new area with numerous unknowns. It is an area of diving where you find yourself all alone with no one to tell you how it’s done. You are now entering an experimental area where you are your own teacher and student.

Of course it’s not all that gloomy, there are plenty of others who have crossed the line of training agency limits and who continue to achieve some remarkable results.

The dangers are all there, but it’s how you manage these dangers and how prepared you going to be before leading up to the dive. The question remains, so where do you start? And what are the training agencies doing to keep up with tech divers demands these days?

It seems that training agencies are reluctant to venture below 99 metres, and push the boundary further in the progression of diving. It didn’t take them long to reach the mixed gas stage when it all happened in the 90’s, but for what ever reason the continued progression of pushing depths seems to have stalled, and instructor levels and skills have stalled with it.

These days divers wishing to venture further start with making contact with divers and clubs who are doing this type of diving; most are happy to share the knowledge. The Sydney Project is one such club who has made it easier for individuals to learn and progress their diving who collaborative effects within its membership base. Sydney Project are not alone though, there are other people and groups who can help to do the same, and everyone strives for improvements all the time to better their skills and techniques.

These groups and individuals are the ones who keep the progression of diving going, and training agencies should take the example and look at how they can start helping divers to become safer, and give them a better avenue to progress their learning.

These days knowing something about tech diving to teach is not good enough, instructors who are not doing the diving they are teaching are not good enough. An instructor that is going to teach expedition type of diving, but never participate themselves will never be able to teach the true sense of what is takes to do it. Just because an instructor has a certain qualification doesn’t mean they have the knowledge to teach. This is seems to be becoming very wide spread and should be eliminated from the diving industry. Students who start with a bad education are behind the eight ball from the start.

It is very important to do your home work and find a good instructor who is doing the dives he is teaching (outside of the course environment), even if it’s going to cost you extra in cash and time - at the end of the day, you are paying to learn how to safeguard your life.

If you dive without association with clubs or groups, then it’s even more critical to become well skilled and educated. Finding the right instructor and start on the right path is the most important decision you will make, and I can’t stress this point enough.

It’s time now that the diving agencies stand up and look at what they are offering the advancing world of diving. The gap between those that are progressing and those that are teaching is widening, and this will only get worst with time unless this is addressed. After all we want to see us all get better and we want to insure that future divers will be safe to enjoy some adventure in their life’s.

The Sydney Project is a technical diving club that welcomes new members, so if you’re interested in joining or just keeping up with our activities, then check out our website at www.sydneyproject.com