HSA Dive Buddy Program

Many of us know someone, a friend or family member, we'd like to involve in scuba diving. Or, perhaps we would welcome the challenge of learning about disabilities, accessibility issues, and how to dive with people who have disabilities. The HSA Dive Buddy Program offers able-bodied divers the opportunity to expand their underwater world to include sharing it with a handicapped partner. An HSA certified Dive Buddy receives almost as much information and skill training as an instructor, but with the focus on the recreational rather than the instructional aspects of diving.

This program is open to any certified diver.

HSA Instructor Training Course

The Instructor Training Course provides three full days of intensive, insightful theory and application for those instructors eager to accept the challenge of gaining specialized teaching knowledge and skills. Medical information is shared through lectures on disabilities, followed by a series of confined and open water exercises designed to simulate disabilities. By "acting out" these handicaps, instructors actually experience what it's like to be a mobility or sight-impaired diver, a sensitizing, often surprising revelation even for instructors who have been teaching diving for many years. Our roster of HSA instructors includes experts in physical rehabilitation counseling, medical doctors and other health care professionals able to directly assess the profound effect of diving on the handicapped individual.

Topics include:

• Disability Types - with emphasis on their relationship to SCUBA diving
• Specific training problems - what to expect and how to deal with them
• Special Considerations - specific to disabilities
• Accessibility Issues - classroom, pool, beaches, boats, restaurants, lodging, transportation

HSA Course Director Program

The Course Director Program is a three-day course conducted through HSA International Headquarters only. (Use our "Link to HSA International" to view information on their web site.)