After another successful Instructor Development Course (IDC) on Koh Tao, Mark and I have each gotten a bit of free time to rest-up and look forward to a very demanding, but eventful month of March. Our last group of Instructor Candidates including Team America (Francis, Rick, Steve and Josh who completed the Assistant Instructor Course) and Tom from Belgium, absolutely sailed through the PADI Instructor Exam as expected. We’ve completed the instructor specialty courses, Mark had a few days at home in front of the TV and I’m relaxing in the Spa Samui for a few days in anticipation of the coming month.
Sorry about the poor quality… this photo’s from my Nokia. Congratulations anyway, guys!
On the 6th of March we’ll be conducting our first Instructor Course on Koh Phangan for one of our ex-IDC candidates. Alex and Rachel, from Sail Rock Divers, have been in the industry for years and have got a fantastic shop on the big island. A few months ago we discussed the possibilty of conducting the first PADI Instructor Course and Instructor Exam on their island, and we all agreed that it would be a great laugh.
Venue for The Koh Phangan IDC… not bad…
Tomorrow, Mark will go across to begin the course and complete the Marine Resource Management specialty and the Emergency First Response Course Instructor (EFRI). I’ll follow on the 10th to take care of the Open Water presentations and prepare the guys for the PADI Instructor Exam.
On the 16th, we’ll begin the Koh Tao IDC with another fantastic group of people from all over the world. At last count, we had 8 different nationalities from 6 different continents (if you count Australia as its own continent, as Mark does!).
We look forward to branching out and helping people in new areas realize their dream of becoming PADI Instructors. Later in the year we’ll be running another IDC on Koh Phangan and one in Bohol, Philippines. In the future, we expect to start running IDC’s in Beijing and we’re in negotiations to begin running courses in Vietnam!
The Thailand Gap- Year Internship crew will definitely be tested in March, but we feel we’re up for the challenge!