Tell a student to quit

[2shay 0]

I have not seen an instructor tell them to quit, but there are a few they should have told to quit. One almost died and now has her license and has hurt herself couple of times and barely jumps enough to stay current. That is pretty scary to me.

don't try your bullshit with me!!!

[winsor 189]

With all due respect to those who suggest that changing instructors is indicated when results are not forthcoming, this approach has its pitfalls.

One flying student, described as having more money than ability, could not meet one instructor's criteria for solo flight and went to another instructor.

Somehow getting cleared to solo, and later the signoff and a checkride, our new pilot dropped the bucks and got a spiffy Centurion. Experimenting with rapid power cuts from high power settings at altitude, the plane ate the turbocharger and he managed to arrive alive.

Since that plane was broken, he got himself a Malibu. With an autopilot and all the navigational whistles and bells, he did fine until he chose to execute a maximum demonstrated crosswind landing (crosswind landings were never his strong suit).

After cartwheeling the Malibu and surviving, he took up another hobby.

A skydiving student with whom I am familiar was considered hopeless at one venue, and went to another. Considered "Ms. Bad Example" there, she went to yet another locale to train. The third location got her through AFF and sent her home.

I was in the air at the same time as this individual once, and was stunned by the lack of control that was demonstrated. Canopy flight proved to be an equally elusive skill, and what should have been a normal landing resulted in dreadful injuries.

In this case, the theoretical concept that anyone is teachable was outweighed by the practical reality. On the one hand, it is good that she did not die. On the other, it was unnecessary to have Blue Cross handle her departure from the sport.

I know some people who got "the talk" and went on to become great skydivers anyway.

I know of many, many more who either got the talk or should have, and went on to become crippled or dead.

I feel better about the people who were craters looking for grid coordinates and are now happy doing other things than I do about those where everyone saw it coming and they stuck around until it did.

James Webb said, in a rather different context, something to the effect that it is fine to train by touch-football rules, but it does not do much for you if you are going up against the Green Bay Packers. Skydiving is a hazardous activity at best, but it is orders of magnitude worse for some than for others. To ignore that reality is to engage in denial, and does nobody any good.


Blue skies,

Winsor

[kelpdiver 2]

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This is exactly what I'm talking about. YOU need to learn how to read. Squeak actually said (and YOU quoted) the person could go away somewhere else to get the training they need to deal with the stress....where did he say keep sending the person up until he hurts himself?

Learn how to debate or stop making such poor attempts at it.

This discussion is better served by staying detached emotionally, and not inflaming it like so.

I am not convinced that people can just go off and learn how to deal with stress. I do believe that there is some transitive value, but if in the past you frequently panic'd skydiving, there's still a good chance that at the first second of adversity you'll remember it and repeat the experience.

Mental blocks are easier to deal with - try a different instructor or DZ, spend some wind tunnel time, or take time off to clear the head. I used all of these in getting past dead weight legs and turning issues. But none of my failed levels came from an inability to see what is around me and pull on time.

You're correct in that virtually everyone improves with practice. The major caveat to this is that the sport has a high bar to start with. Improving from 30% likely to die to 10% likely to die isn't sufficient, esp if it will put other jumpers at risk.

[Zenister 0]

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all things being considered NO ONE is UNTEACHABLE

perhaps.. but if it takes 5000 hours for you to learn what an 'average' student does in 50, it is largely NOT WORTH THE INSTRUCTOR OR THE STUDENTS TIME.

you can break any complex action down to simple steps, and teach those steps one at a time. As long as the task being performed IS NOT time critical you can take years to learn anything..

skydiving IS time critical. Sure you could 'babysit' the bowlers for 500 dives until they had learned every simple action in sequence in order not to die, but is it really WORTH the time (yours or theirs)?

Time is the one thing you cant simply 'go get' more of... at some point if your student cant hit what has been established as 'average benchmarks' they need to be classified as 'untrainable (by usual means)' and handed off to someone who wants to 'dumb it down' for them.

You are free to go to extremes to attempt to teach those people, but that doenst mean that every instructor who is unwilling or unable to teach to 'special needs' students is a poor teacher.

____________________________________
Those who fail to learn from the past are simply Doomed.

[livendive 8]

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Is it ok for an instructor or a group of instructors to tell a student they should not continue skydiving or in kinder terms tell them they are not cut out for it?

No.

You do not have that right to do that no matter how nicely you put it.

.

Dairy Queen reserves the right to refuse service to anyone. Skydiving instructors should too.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[dorbie 0]

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I remember thinking as a student on the course that she might kill herself and I was relieved the instructor did what he did.

When I was doing my student freefall progression in the 1980's (under the static line system), there was a fellow student at about the same point in his training, also doing freefalls. He had a malfunction and seemed to freeze, and simply waited until his AAD fired, which fortunately it did. After the jump he seemed rather unaware of what had happened and seemed at a loss to explain what had transpired on the jump or the reasons for his inaction.

Although I wasn't an instructor--then or now--I was a peer and therefore certainly watched closely what was happening with other students at a similar point. I remember thinking, after this jump, that he might kill himself and was rather mortified when he continued jumping.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I logged on to these forums for the first time a few days ago and discovered (without naming names) that this person now has over 11,000 jumps and is considered one of the best skydivers in the world.

Again, I'm a student myself--not an instructor--so my ability to evaluate these things is limited but it seems to me that it just goes to show you it is very hard to evaluate how someone will turn out based on a scary performance on an early jump.

As I read your response I was thinking that it could happen to any student, you never know and most of us as students are never tested under those extremes, and might not be the final determination about what kind of skydiver you ultimately become.

This woman had a serious age related learning impediment though, and even a student in a class can see rather clearly when another student is way out of their depth on the theoretical material presented to everyone. So ultimately I don't think your tale informs the scanario I saw. I'm not saying I could have assessed when someone is borderline or any of the complexities of an overall evaluation, but I could clearly see someone struggling to absorb very basic theory, and ultimately my instrutor saw the same thing which makes the discussion moot.

None of this was really the point of my post though. The main point of my post was that there is an alternative to giving someone the bowling talk and my FJC instructor used it, telling this particular student that the way they should experince the sport should be limited to tandems for now. It seemed like a wiser/kinder approach.

[SivaGanesha 2]

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As I read your response I was thinking that it could happen to any student, you never know and most of us as students are never tested under those extremes, and might not be the final determination about what kind of skydiver you ultimately become.

This woman had a serious age related learning impediment though, and even a student in a class can see rather clearly when another student is way out of their depth on the theoretical material presented to everyone. So ultimately I don't think your tale informs the scanario I saw. I'm not saying I could have assessed when someone is borderline or any of the complexities of an overall evaluation, but I could clearly see someone struggling to absorb very basic theory, and ultimately my instrutor saw the same thing which makes the discussion moot.

None of this was really the point of my post though. The main point of my post was that there is an alternative to giving someone the bowling talk and my FJC instructor used it, telling this particular student that the way they should experince the sport should be limited to tandems for now. It seemed like a wiser/kinder approach.

I think there are a couple of points to make here. One is that there is a huge leap, in terms of the level of responsibility required, in going from tandem to AFF-1. Very little is expected of the tandem student other than to be a good passenger. But immediately, with AFF-1, much more is expected. The student has primary responsibility for deploying their main, the student usually has sole responsibility for the cutaway and deploying their reserve, and the student must fly a safe pattern, approach, flare, and landing.

There doesn't appear to be anywhere else in a skydiver's progression where there is as huge an increase in responsibility from one jump to the next as between tandem and AFF-1 (except maybe someone's first BASE jump, but that is usually years later). Yes, at some point the instructors let go of the student for the first time, but they will only do so if they are comfortable having jumped several times with the student before, and they will still keep close by to be able to re-dock quickly if necessary, etc.

In other words, after AFF-1, progression in skydiving is very gradual and the student can proceed at their own pace. But there is a huge leap from tandem to AFF-1.

So if the student cannot make that transition safely, there may be no choice but to limit them to tandems. However, it seems that after the student does the introductory AFF jumps safely, there should be no reason to ever tell them to quit. It is up to the student to decide if their progression is taking too long to be worth it. The instructors' job is to provide feedback and not allow the students to progress faster than they are ready. I don't understand why one would say that it would take so long that it would not be worth it. It is the student who is investing their time and money--the instructors are generally being paid for their time and if the student is comfortable with a slower pace, I'm not sure why that would be an issue for the instructors provided the student has shown they can do the introductory AFF jumps safely.

It is a somewhat different issue if someone has been cleared off student status--which presumably implies they know how to do a safe skydive--but continues to perform actions that they should know better than to do. At some point they may need to be grounded.

"It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

[damion75 0]

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This is exactly what I'm talking about. YOU need to learn how to read. Squeak actually said (and YOU quoted) the person could go away somewhere else to get the training they need to deal with the stress....where did he say keep sending the person up until he hurts himself?

Learn how to debate or stop making such poor attempts at it.

Boy you get emotional quickly - relax, this is just an internet discussion...

Unfortunately here you are trying the classic debating tactic of turning from practicalities into semantics.

You want to send the student 'somewhere else to get the training they need to deal with the stress'? So how are you going to get someone used to exiting a plane 2.5 miles up without... getting them out of a plane 2.5 miles up? The wind tunnel? Funnily enough its not the same - that's why they let tiny kids in the tunnel, but not out of the plane (unless you are in Spain, but neither of us are!)

The problem is people's psychological response to stress caused by specific stimuli. The only way to overcome their programmed responses (go foetal etc) is to place them in the same circumstances with a gradually altered mindset over and over again until they can build themselves a new set of psychological triggers. Unfortunately this approach requires time, and continued jumping in circumstances which are significantly riskier than the student may be aware of (ref my last post). So who is benefitting?

If you are in doubt about this, have a look at the thread 'Door Demon' in Gen Skydiving (written by an individual who is having stress / fear issues) and note how many of the contributors reckon that going in a wind tunnel, or changing instructors, will help her...

And please, please, please - attack the argument not the individual. You may be better placed to do this when you have got your instructor ratings and have had to make this decision (keep training or not) yourself.

And Squeak - that verged on a PA... let keep this discussion about the issues...

***************

Not one shred of evidence supports the theory that life is serious - look at the platypus.

[Squeak 17]

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And Squeak - that verged on a PA... let keep this discussion about the issues...

I'll do that as long as you engage your brain before you type

You are not now, nor will you ever be, good enough to not die in this sport (Sparky)
My Life ROCKS!
How's yours doing?

[damion75 0]

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And Squeak - that verged on a PA... let keep this discussion about the issues...

I'll do that as long as you engage your brain before you type

*Sigh*

So that's two posts without an actual response to my point of view. I am interested to find out what I have stated that you disagree with... apart from the basic premis of course...

***************

Not one shred of evidence supports the theory that life is serious - look at the platypus.

[billvon 2,464]

>Any student can be taught to do anything.

That is quite literally correct. You can teach anyone to skydive. If they then jump and do nothing but flail about until their cypres fires, you could well claim that they had "been taught to skydive" - but that does not mean they CAN skydive.

>Just because a student is not living up to "your" standards as an
>instructor or what you think a skydiver or in my case a firefighter should
>be, you need to ask your self if the person can function safely.

Of course. That's the bottom line in any skydiving course, whether it's AFF, SL, IAD, or a freefall progression.

>If the answer is no then you need to ask your self as an instructor why
>that is. Is it your own fault for being to judgemental or are you just a
>bad instructor.

Those are both possibilities. There is a third possibility, which is that the student cannot skydive safely enough to meet the minimum standards that (in our case) USPA lays out. Not everyone is capable of everything.

>The only reason for telling someone to quit is after exhausting all other
>options, and they are constantly acting unsafe.

I agree. Many people have the ability to skydive safely given the proper education, even if it takes 10 different instructors, 50 AFF's or hours of tunnel time (and I've seen it take those things in the past.) However, some people do _not_ have the ability, and it's important as an instructor to be able to make that call. It's never an easy call to make - but it is critical that we are willing to make it. It is quite literally a life and death decision.

[kelly.fischer 0]

i just took my solo course the other day and plan to continue with the sport; but my teacher was REALLY hard core. he drilled it into us the importance of how dangerous the sport of diving is. we reached one point where it was sorta climatic in his entire session where he opted us to leave now, with full opening to get our payments back, because if we do not think we can handle the fast pace dissisions, we need to walk out then.


well, i didnt. tempted, but i didnt. im still not 100% confident with myself, but im hopeing to learn more and more as i go on, and though i dont want to gain 100% confidence(as i would think that can lead to poor dissisions) i want to feel confident i can handle a malfunction and emergency situation, and come out alive and in one piece.

eer... long story short, thats the closest ive ever had to a "get out now" senerio with a instructor.

[kkeenan 13]

Hang in there. It's no more complicated than operating the "Shift" key on your computer. How hard could that be ?? ...Uh, on second thought, maybe you should bail.

_____________________________________
Dude, you are so awesome...
Can I be on your ash jump ?

[Jumpah 0]

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Teachers telling students that they are not cut out to do such-n-such is a signature of a bad teacher.

Could you explain this statement a bit more? It seems broad and overly bold.

(edited for clarity)

[Sutton 0]

I guess it depends on the situation. Obviously, if they are a direct danger to themselves or others in the air, they should consider quitting on their own, but it usually isn't that easy.

I'd suggest asking other jumpers that have seen the student jump before and see what they think.

-Sutton

[MakeItHappen 15]

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Teachers telling students that they are not cut out to do such-n-such is a signature of a bad teacher.

Could you explain this statement a bit more? It seems broad and overly bold.

(edited for clarity)

A teacher that only knows a student for a few hours at best, really has no idea on what makes the student tick.
A teacher may think they know, but they really don't.

Let me give you some examples.

Waay back in the olden days, my 3rd or 4th grade teacher made a bunch of us stand up at our desks because we 'failed' some test. I forget the subject area. She went on telling the rest of the class that 'none of these students studied and were goof-offs.' or words to that effect. The problem was that I did study for many hours. But I'll never forget the inane accusations that made me and the others (about 1/3 of the class) feel as though we were shit.

When I was in college as an undergrad, I had several teachers (and other students) tell me 'We'll see how long it lasts' when they found out I wanted to major in physics.

When I was a grad student, I had a major professor tell me that he didn't like women students because 'they just get married and quit', unfortunately it was after he was already my major professor.

When I was a student jumper I had several JMs tell me 'You know skydiving isn't for everyone.'

Not a single one of these teachers was right. They had no idea on what I did or did not do to get through school or what my motivations were. The damage that these teachers did was immeasurable.

Teachers have a responsibility to students to encourage them and provide skills and knowledge to allow a student to succeed. They do not have the authority to tell someone 'Hey, you are not cut out for such-n-such.'

.

.
Make It Happen
Parachute History
DiveMaker

[AFFI 0]

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Teachers telling students that they are not cut out to do such-n-such is a signature of a bad teacher.

Could you explain this statement a bit more? It seems broad and overly bold.

(edited for clarity)

A teacher that only knows a student for a few hours at best, really has no idea on what makes the student tick.
A teacher may think they know, but they really don't.

Let me give you some examples.

Waay back in the olden days, my 3rd or 4th grade teacher made a bunch of us stand up at our desks because we 'failed' some test. I forget the subject area. She went on telling the rest of the class that 'none of these students studied and were goof-offs.' or words to that effect. The problem was that I did study for many hours. But I'll never forget the inane accusations that made me and the others (about 1/3 of the class) feel as though we were shit.

When I was in college as an undergrad, I had several teachers (and other students) tell me 'We'll see how long it lasts' when they found out I wanted to major in physics.

When I was a grad student, I had a major professor tell me that he didn't like women students because 'they just get married and quit', unfortunately it was after he was already my major professor.

When I was a student jumper I had several JMs tell me 'You know skydiving isn't for everyone.'

Not a single one of these teachers was right. They had no idea on what I did or did not do to get through school or what my motivations were. The damage that these teachers did was immeasurable.

Teachers have a responsibility to students to encourage them and provide skills and knowledge to allow a student to succeed. They do not have the authority to tell someone 'Hey, you are not cut out for such-n-such.'

.

TRUST ME

I have worked with individuals who wanted to learn to skydive that are not at all "cut out for it".

Mykel AFF-I10
Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat…

[denete 2]

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Obviously, if they are a direct danger to themselves or others in the air, they should consider quitting on their own, but it usually isn't that easy.

My guess is that most who are dangerous don't realize that they are dangerous. It takes a good instructor to know how to balance the info on how to improve with the info that they are not going to be a successful skydiver.

SCR #14809

"our attitude is the thing most capable of keeping us safe"
(look, grab, look, grab, peel, punch, punch, arch)

[MakeItHappen 15]

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TRUST ME

I have worked with individuals who wanted to learn to skydive that are not at all "cut out for it".

I agree that there are folks not cut out for skydiving. What I am saying is that teachers may not always be right in their evaluation.
It's better to get a student to come to the conclusion they are not cut out for it.

.

.
Make It Happen
Parachute History
DiveMaker

[AFFI 0]

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It's better to get a student to come to the conclusion they are not cut out for it.

You are totally right...

I am currently trying to get someone to realize that and being subtle has not worked yet.

Mykel AFF-I10
Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat…

[billvon 2,464]

>It's better to get a student to come to the conclusion they are not cut out for it.

I definitely agree. Unfortunately, I have also noticed that the people with the biggest problems in this area tend to be the ones that lack the ability to be introspective, and it can often take a significant external stimulus to make them realize this. They will likely come to the realization that skydiving is not for them while in the ambulance; the trick is to get them to realize it before that.

[Jumpah 0]

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TRUST ME

I have worked with individuals who wanted to learn to skydive that are not at all "cut out for it".

I agree that there are folks not cut out for skydiving. What I am saying is that teachers may not always be right in their evaluation.
It's better to get a student to come to the conclusion they are not cut out for it.

.

OK, this is much more reasonable and I can agree with that. Based on your original comments, it sounds like you were saying that all teachers (any topic) never have the right to tell someone they were not cut out to do such-and-such. Skydiving is life or death...one doesn't die if they can't solve the equation.

Yes, sure they may not be right in their evaluation, but if someone is clearly a hazard he should be held back. Hell, I was held back in Kindergarten...look at me now! haha

[flyinchicken 0]

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It's the instructor/teacher's responsibility to overcome any and all obstacles a student may present to you that would prevent him/her from making a survivable skydive and in correlation, if he/she goes out and kills themselves, it's the instructor's fault.

I fully believe this statement. It is why I refuse to become skydiving instructor under any capacity and why I refer every new jumper to the most experienced on the dz. If I WERE an instructor and a student of mine hurt themselves, I would feel responsible.
As a teacher it IS your responsibility to recognize when you aren't getting through to a student and to send them to a new instructor. I teach my craft and every one of my proteges(except one who walked out on the job) has become the busiest and the best in our field. Teaching is a humbling experience and those that do not think so aren't doing it well.

"Diligent observation leads to pure abstraction". Lari Pittman

[AFFI 0]

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It's the instructor/teacher's responsibility to overcome any and all obstacles a student may present to you that would prevent him/her from making a survivable skydive and in correlation, if he/she goes out and kills themselves, it's the instructor's fault.

I fully believe this statement. It is why I refuse to become skydiving instructor under any capacity and why I refer every new jumper to the most experienced on the dz. If I WERE an instructor and a student of mine hurt themselves, I would feel responsible.
As a teacher it IS your responsibility to recognize when you aren't getting through to a student and to send them to a new instructor. I teach my craft and every one of my proteges(except one who walked out on the job) has become the busiest and the best in our field. Teaching is a humbling experience and those that do not think so aren't doing it well.

It is a HEAVY responsibility, very heavy – and some instructors I have worked with do not believe it is.

Anytime I fall short, anytime I make a slight mistake, I loose sleep.
This may sound silly, but one time an EX-student that I worked really hard on got fucked up nearly 2 years after student status, and I felt incredibly responsible! Lost plenty of sleep over it, nearly hung up my spurs (Texas thing) and quit instructing over it. It was really hard.

Mykel AFF-I10
Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat…

[flyinchicken 0]

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Anytime I fall short, anytime I make a slight mistake, I loose sleep.
This may sound silly, but one time an EX-student that I worked really hard on got fucked up nearly 2 years after student status, and I felt incredibly responsible! Lost plenty of sleep over it, nearly hung up my spurs (Texas thing) and quit instructing over it. It was really hard.

Two years is a long time, they survived student status and you were confident they could take over from there. That is where your resposibility ends. Make sure you draw lines or you will be wasting a lot of energy worrying about things you cannot control IMHO Your concerns are exactly why i would never do it though. Thanks to all of you who take on the job and do it well.

"Diligent observation leads to pure abstraction". Lari Pittman