The National Association of Underwater Instructors (NAUI Worldwide) is a non-profit association of scuba instructors. It primarily serves as a recreational dive certification and membership organization established to provide international diver standards and education programs. The agency was founded in 1960 by Albert Tillman and Neal Hess. NAUI is headquartered in the Tampa, Florida area with dive and member instructors, resorts, stores, service and training centers, located around the world.
It was officially CE and International Organization for Standardization (ISO) certified in May 2007 in all three diver levels and both instructor levels and re-certified for its scuba diving programs as meeting ISO and European Underwater Federation standards on November 24, 2015.
The US Internal Revenue Service determined that NAUI be a tax-exempt non-profit educational organization in 1971.
Agency standards, policies, and ethics are governed by the Association's Board of Directors, who are members themselves and who are each elected through a democratic election process by the overall instructor membership.
History
After Jacques-Yves Cousteau introduced the Aqua-Lung to the market, there followed a growing interest in scuba diving by the public and a subsequent need to codify the training.
In 1951, Jim Auxie Jr and Chuck Blakeslee started a magazine called The Skin Diver (later renamed Skin Diver Magazine). Two-year dive teacher Neal Earl Hess contributed to its "The Instructors Corner" column to inform readers about scuba. He soon established a column called "The National Diving Patrol" as a section to name new skin and scuba diving "instructors".
Still, no official training and certifying agency existed, except for the training and resources provided by the military (Underwater Demolition Teams) and dive clubs.
In 1952, Al Tillman, the director of sports for the Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation, said in a letter to Parks and Recreation director Paul Gruendyke, "A new sport—skin diving—is becoming popular in the area. Recently while diving in Palos Verdes, I ran into several divers in the water with me who didn't know what they were doing. One had one of the new underwater breathing units that allows divers to stay under for long periods of time... I propose that my department get involved in this sport and provide training classes. I believe that diving will grow in the future and we have an obligation to make the sport as safe as possible."
In 1955, Tillman and L.A. County lifeguard Bev Morgan created the L.A. County Parks and Recreational Underwater Instructor Certification Course (1UICC) in an effort to respond to the growing number of diver requests. It was the world's first civilian training program to certify recreational divers and soon began granting Provisional Certification to instructors across the country.
In the May 1960 issue of Skin Diver Magazine, the creation of The National Diving Patrol was announced as an official, national organization. Its purpose and function was "to insure competent underwater instruction and to reduce diving accidents through education." In 1959, the name was changed to the National Association of Underwater Instructors (NAUI).
Hess, Blakeslee, Auxier, and Tillman met in August 1960 to discuss and organize NAUI's first Instructor Certification Course. It was held at the Shamrock Hotel in Houston, Texas on August 22–26. During the six-day course, 72 candidates attended from the U.S. and Canada, but only 53 graduated. The 53 graduates and their staff instructors became the first instructor members of the National Association of Underwater Instructors. The NAUI ICC became the first course to make diver certification available worldwide.
A year later, the second NAUI ICC was held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, under the direction of Ben Davis.
In October 1961, NAUI was incorporated in the State of California as a non-profit educational organization, with Al Tillman as the President and Neal Hess as the Executive Secretary.
NAUI's first elected Board of Directors included Al Tillman, John C. Jones, Jr., Neal Hess, Garry Howland, Jim Auxier, and James Cahill. A Board of Advisers was appointed and included Captain Albert Behnke, Jr., Commander George Bond, Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau, and Dr. Andreas Rechnitzer.