Misconceptions of UTD Essentials & Intro to Tech

Between the misinformation we've seen and heard, and some of the questions we've been asked, I thought I'd provide some insight into the UTD Essentials, Intro to Tech, Rec 2 and the general UTD teaching philosophy overall.

While the "T" in UTD does stand for "Team", it's important to remember that we believe a diver must have solid foundational and personal skills before moving on to team skills. In other words, if a student can't perform a modified s-drill (personal skill) without losing their trim or buoyancy (foundational skills), how will they be able to perform a full s-drill with a teammate? While the "team" aspect is a critical aspect to the UTD approach, that is just one block in the overall structure, and the top block is only as solid as the blocks below supporting it.

This is where some misinformation and inaccurate comparisons exist with the Essentials class. Essentials is exactly as its name implies. It teaches the essential skills of safe diving. It is, by design, a personal skills class, not a team skills class. We focus on the foundational skills of buoyancy, trim, kicks and balance. We then move to the personal skills of the Basic 6 and smb deployment. Team skills are introduced and performed, but again, the focus of this class is to develop the skills needed to become a safer diver and, in turn, a better teammate.

For the reasons stated above, Essentials is a very common entry point into the UTD curriculum. While divers at any level, including instructors, photographers and experienced divers will benefit from the class, it's designed to provide a diver who has taken their open water class from outside the UTD curriculum a means of learning the skills required for future UTD classes.

In other words, most open water students wanting to take Rec 2, which is the "equivalent" of Advanced and Nitrox combined, and also where team skills and light critical skills (failures) are introduced would very quickly be overwhelmed, simply because they haven't built the foundation needed for that class. They wouldn't learn anything from the class because they'd be in over their head from the very beginning.

This isn't to say that every diver wanting to enter the UTD Recreational curriculum must first take Essentials, as we do accept equivalents. However, Essentials was designed to teach the foundational and personal skills, and introduce team skills, in a non-evaluation environment where the student can focus simply on learning, and not the pressure of passing or failing.

Additionally, there are also only 2 gear requirements for the Essentials class...a 7' long hose and blade style, non-split fins. It was important to us to make this class accessible to anyone wanting to take it, without a large investment in gear and equipment.

The UTD Intro to Tech class, while similar to the Essentials class in several ways, does differ in that it is an evaluation class. Intro to Tech is a more robust course, where the student is learning the skills needed to enter the UTD Technical Diving curriculum, in a non-critical skills (failure) environment. To enter the Tech 1 class, where the student will be entering mandatory decompression obligations, the student must first meet the standards of the Intro to Tech class. To that end, the Intro to Tech class is an evaluation class, but the student is still learning the required foundational, personal and team skills required to build that foundation needed for more advanced technical diving.

The Intro to Tech class is taken in double cylinders and a decompression bottle. We feel that teaching the mechanics of gas switches, stowing and bottle passing in a non-critical skills environment allows the student to learn properly the first time and also allows them time to go practice their new skills before entering the Tech 1 curriculum, where failures are introduced.

Upon entering the Rec 2 (after Essentials) or Tech 1 (after Intro to Tech), the focus shifts to team, awareness, problem solving and thinking. This is because they now have the foundation built, and they can refocus their new extra bandwidth towards those areas, as it is no longer needed for their own skills.

It should be noted that this method is not the only dive instruction philosophy. It's simply UTD's training approach.

Hopefully this clears up some of the confusion.

Brian

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Comment by Nicole Tebaldi on October 22, 2009 at 11:20am: Thanks for the info, Maciek!

Comment by Maciej Arkuszewski on October 22, 2009 at 11:09am: (or equivalent as prerequisite)

Because we recognize that people often are not coming to us from different planet, we are purposefully keeping things open with "(equivalent or prerequisite)" clause. We require skills not certs - certs are just easier way to confirm that you have skills. This can also be achieved by a checkout dive.

And obviously certs also have a different weight - Completing Intro to Tech guarantees that you passed certain bar with doubles and deco bottle and were deemed ready for T1. Taking Doubles Mini means that you completed workshop which introduced you to diving doubles and hopefully walked away from it with good understanding what you need to work on before moving on to Rec 3 or T1. I would still like to check if you did your homework.

Comment by Maciej Arkuszewski on October 22, 2009 at 10:21am: Hi Nicole.

There's no such pre-requisite. It all boils down to instructors assessment of that person capabilities. Passing Intro to Tech essentially gives you that assessment in writing, but it's pointless to require that hoop if you already have the skills especially when we have means to verify that.

Andy is teaching T1 right now with one student after Intro To Tech and second student with Essentials/Doubles Mini/Scooter 1.

Regards

Comment by Nicole Tebaldi on October 22, 2009 at 9:11am: Rainer just pointed out this thread to me....so thanks.

I have a question for one of the UTD instructors. Say you have a student who has been diving with like-minded divers, is in doubles, is comfortable with the use of a deco bottle, a good teammate, etc....but this person hasn't taken an Intro to Tech equivalent class. While their skills are equivalent to that level, they haven't taken a class that says they're at that level....are you willing to do "one checkout dive" and evaluate their performance?

Or in this situation, is ItT a firm pre-requisite for Tech 1?

Comment by Todd Powell on October 11, 2009 at 9:48pm: Hey all,

One checkout dive can accomplish alot if it's setup properly of what is expected.
Team Awareness, Equipment Awareness, Environmental Awareness, and overall Skill can be looked at during one dive. However, if I feel I need to have another assessment dive with that potential student, I will do so.
On any given assessment dive, an Instructor can look at many things during the dive.

Just go on a dive.....
Descend as a team, go on a dive as a team, run some line as a team.....
Shoot a bag....divers do Valve Drills, divers do S-drills, deco bottle work, etc....
Timed ascent drill...

All of the things stated above allow me to evaluate a potential student.
Take for example the Valve Drill/S-Drill. So may divers think that this skill is ONLY about reaching the valves and turning knobs. This is what they focus on. Watching a diver or a team of divers do these drills allows me to test the divers ability in the water not only in actually performing the drill (equipment awareness), but tests their attention to environmental awareness, team awareness, etc....

I know it may seem like "one dive" is not enough, but you would be suprised on how much you can tell about a diver during that one dive if they are ready or not for a UTD Tech 1 class.

Thanks all,

Todd

Comment by Jeff Seckendorf on October 11, 2009 at 9:17pm: With all the dives you've done, and we've done together and talked about, don't you feel like you can evaluate someone's awareness after a bottle switch and a timed ascent?

Comment by Jeff Seckendorf on October 11, 2009 at 8:15pm: I feel completely confident that we can tell if someone is ready for critical skills after one assessment dive in the Tech 1 configuration...doubles, deco bottle, light, all that. Nail your buoyancy, do a clean bottle switch, an air sharing ascent, and don't knock your teammate's mask off with your fins while on ascent.

Remember, these are teaching classes, not just evaluation classes. In UTD classes, evaluations happen after the teaching part, so in this particular conversation, we're looking to see if someone has the equivalent of Intro to Tech skills, not Tech 1 skills.

Comment by Jeff Seckendorf on October 11, 2009 at 3:20pm: To start Tech 1, an incoming student would need Intro to Tech or equivalent. The equivalency can be from another agency or from experience, and generally requires an assessment dive with the instructor.

Almost all the UTD classes are set up that way. We do not require you to start for the beginning with us, but we do want to be sure you are in an appropriate class for your experience and education.

Jeff

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