AIDA Canada’s commitment to freediving safety and education

True to its name* and mandate, AIDA Canada has always been committed to the safe development of breath-hold diving activities, whether recreational or competitive.

Shortly after its incorporation, AIDA Canada set out to develop and implement a specific program dedicated to the training of safety freedivers. At the helm of this program is Doug Sitter, Freedive Toronto President, who designed and implemented it. Over the course of months, he trained and prepared eight individuals from Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia.  Doug and his group were selected to provide safety at the 2009 Freediving World Championships in the Bahamas, where they were soon deemed the best freediving safety divers team, the ultimate recognition.

AIDA Canada’s other priority is freediving education.  Without proper freediving education, no breath-hold diving activity is safe. While few agencies exist within the sport of freediving, the AIDA system was not developed until recently in Canada. Indeed, about a year ago, the AIDA Canada Board brought up concerns to the AIDA International Board about the shortage of AIDA Instructor Trainers (ITs). The AIDA Canada Board explained that short of flying qualified Canadian candidates overseas for training there would be the need for allocating a specific IT for Canada. It turns out that thanks to AIDA Canada’s initiative, AIDA International has since implemented a new plan to promote AIDA Education worldwide.

This is how:

Importance of AIDA Education and Instructor Trainers

AIDA International considered the request made by AIDA Canada. At that time, AIDA International totaled approximately ten AIDA ITs world-wide, only about half of them actively teaching, a number too low to meet the education needs of AIDA National members such as AIDA Canada and its membership.

To address this issue, AIDA International’s President, Kimmo Lahtinen, and the AIDA Board made the development of AIDA’s Instructor Trainer program a strategic goal for AIDA in 2011. In order to provide and receive adequate freediving education, AIDA Nationals and their divers require reasonable access to AIDA Instructor Trainers (ITs), who can train AIDA Instructors, as well as teach other AIDA courses.

More AIDA Instructor Trainers

To remedy this situation, the AIDA International Board set both short term and long term goals for increasing the numbers of AIDA Instructor Trainers: in the short term (next 1-2 years), the goal was to have an AIDA Instructor Trainer per AIDA National; in the long term, AIDA’s goal would be to develop Instructor Trainers organically: by instructors moving up through the ranks of the AIDA education system (Instructor -> Master Instructor -> Instructor Trainer) by teaching, as well as judging, competing, and contributing to their AIDA National. The goal is to have an AIDA IT in each country with an AIDA National, and sufficient Instructors to ensure that competition keeps course fees reasonable. These goals parallel those of other dive agencies, which have significant numbers of instructor trainers worldwide.


Strategic Role of Instructor Trainers; Instructor Trainer Characteristics

Instructor Trainers serve a strategic role for AIDA (as they do for other dive agencies), being highly visible representatives of AIDA, contributing to the Education Committee (EC) and to the quality of educational materials, and acting as role models for students, instructors, and divers generally. Because of this strategic role, it is important that each AIDA Instructor Trainer have a number of key characteristics: freediving expertise, teaching expertise, contribution to their AIDA National and/or AIDA International, competition experience, (preferably) judge experience, and the judgment and commitment expected of the highest level representatives of the AIDA Education System.


Candidate in Canada

In order to meet the immediate need for Instructor Trainers in many countries, AIDA International reach out to AIDA Nationals to propose candidates who already had extraordinary levels of freediving, teaching and other relevant skills.  Hence, AIDA Canada proposed William Winram as a qualified candidate. Key criteria were his freediving expertise (world-class athlete with international competition experience and several medals during world championships; lends his breath-hold diving skills to support research on large marine animals), teaching expertise (has been teaching specialty freediving courses world-wide since 2005; designs individual training programs; has taught at a post-secondary level), founder of AIDA Canada and board member 2009-2011, member of the Technical commission for AIDA International 2008-2009.


Selection and Training for Canada’s Instructor Trainer

Through the Instructor Trainer program,  AIDA International not only intends to increase the number of AIDA Instructor Trainers, but also to increase the quality of AIDA Instructor Trainers. The EC reviewed AIDA Canada’s proposal and made its recommendations to the Board. William Winram’s candidacy was approved by the AIDA International Board on the condition that he would, at a minimum, need to participate in an AIDA Instructor course, to learn AIDA teaching techniques, to gain experience teaching instructors, and to make contributions to AIDA educational materials. William Winram fully committed to these conditions and in January 2011 travelled to Greece to undertake his training (the course was an Instructor/Instructor Trainer course).

Selection and Training for Canada’s new instructors

Throughout the spring, he co-taught several AIDA courses. Once William Winram’s Intructor Trainer status was approved by AIDA International, he offered to train qualifying candidates in BC, Ontario and Quebec, on the condition that there would be a minimum of 2 people in each location. Candidates would only share the cost of his travel and receive the training free of charge. All qualifying candidates used their vacation time to attend this intensive certification process. They were selected for their diving and teaching background.  In the summer, his AIDA Instructor Trainer status in hand, William Winram travelled back to Canada and donated his time to teach a total of eight instructor candidates (4 in Ontario and 4 in Quebec). This initial training has yielded 8 new AIDA instructors in Canada. The program is ongoing and the goal is to have more instructors trained in other parts of Canada.

More about these eight new AIDA Instructors soon.

 

*AIDA Canada is the national governing body designated by AIDA International: Association Internationale pour le Développement de l’Apnée – International Association for the Development of Apnea