Classes

Small classes and personalized attention are what you can expect. We teach people how to scuba dive because we enjoy it, and we want you to have fun too.

Huge classes are uncomfortable for you, and not very much fun for us. With a large class, you spend more time waiting than you do learning. We try to limit our classes to four people, though we will make exceptions if you have a larger group and want to get certified together.

First you will read a quick and interesting book and watch a video covering many aspects of learning to scuba dive.  You can do both of these on your own time and on your own schedule.  We offer as much or as little classroom work as you like.  If you want to go over everything in detail, no problem.  If you want to concentrate on studying at home, and everything is pretty clear to you, then at minimum, we need to go over the Knowledge Reviews in the back of each chapter, and take five tests.  Don't worry--the first four have ten questions and the final has 50, and they are all multiple choice.  Some even have pictures!  We have a great classroom facility right here in Moline, or we can take our "show on the road" if that works better for you.

Then we head to the pool.  The book and the video will have provided you with an overview of everything we will be doing in the pool, which is mostly have a lot of fun. We still get a kick out of seeing the excitement in people's eyes when they take their first breaths underwater.  Depending on how many students we have, we can usually get all the pool dives done in a couple of evenings.

At this point you have a choice.  You need to do four checkout dives.  If you want to get your certification close to home before your tropical vacation, you will want option one:  We head up to a scuba diving lake just north of Rockford.  Pearl Lake is set up just for scuba diving, with platforms for our checkout dives, a school bus, a panel van, a submarine (yes, it is yellow), an airplane, a fishing trawler, and numerous speed boats and cabin cruisers for our diving pleasure.  We usually do our dives on Saturday and Sunday.  The four dives must be done over two days, so you can stay overnight and make a weekend of it, unless you would prefer to drive home and then back up on Sunday morning.

Option two is to do your checkout dives during your tropical vacation.  We will send you with all the paperwork you need, so all you will have to do is complete those four checkout dives.  Unless you want to bring your loyal and trusted instructor along with you!

 

What classes are available?

• Discover Scuba Diving
• Open Water Diver
• Junior Open Water Diver
• Adventure Diver
• Advanced Open Water Diver
• Rescue Diver
• Divemaster
• Peak Performance Buoyancy Specialty
• Enriched Air (Nitrox) Specialty
• Emergency Oxygen Provider Specialty
• Wreck Diver Specialty
• Underwater Navigator Specialty
• Underwater Photography Specialty
• Digital Underwater Photographer Specialty
• Deep Diver Specialty
• Scuba Review
• Discover Snorkeling
• PADI Skin Diver
• Bubblemaker
• PADI Seal Team
• Project AWARE Specialty
• AWARE Coral Reef Conservation
• And others...just ask!

What DAN classes are available?

• Oxygen First Aid for Scuba Diving Injuries
• Oxygen First Aid for Aquatic Emergencies
• Advanced Oxygen First Aid for Scuba Diving Injuries
• Remote Emergency Medical Oxygen (REMO2)
• On-Site Neurological Assessment for Divers
• Automatic External Defibrillators for Scuba Diving
• Automatic External Defibrillators for Aquatic Emergencies
• First Aid for Hazardous Marine Life Injuries
• DAN Diving Emergency Management Provider
• Basic Life Support for Dive Professionals