SSI Pro Training
powered by Punkfish Academy
Our Pro Training Program
Do you want to become a Divemaster or Scuba Instructor? Great! But have you really thought it through?
Diving can be addictive—you’ve probably noticed that already, otherwise you wouldn’t be here. You love being underwater, you’re not put off by the effort it takes, and you want to inspire others.
For most people, a long-term career as a dive instructor isn’t the goal. You want to fill a gap year (or a few), travel the world for a while on a low budget, do a job you’re happy to get up for in the morning. Or you’re looking for something you can do occasionally alongside your main job—maybe for a few months as extra support during high season. That’s exactly what the path to becoming a dive professional is perfect for. And for some, over the years it turns into a real, solid profession.
At Punkfish Diving and in the Punkfish Academy, we support you throughout the entire journey into—and through—your work as an SSI Pro. Our focus isn’t on stacking as many courses as possible as quickly as possible; we want you to become a truly good dive professional. That’s why you’re always welcome to stay on La Palma for as long as you like during any Pro course and join as many dives as you want: in every course, you should have the chance to gain real experience. And we’ll show you how to teach skills from the very beginning without kneeling—you’ll see, this concept simply produces better divers. And if you already have experience as an SSI Instructor, you can qualify with us for various specialties, or take the step to Assistant Instructor Trainer and help train the next generation of dive professionals.
Caught the bug? Feel free to browse our site, and get in touch if you’re interested in a course.
Become an SSI Dive Pro – and keep learning
SSI ITC: Become a dive instructor
On our site you’ll find material for your Assistant Instructor and Instructor course—practical, and going beyond the SSI materials to provide perfect preparation for your course.
Specialty Instructor and Assistant Instructor Trainer
The more you’re qualified to teach, the more varied and colorful your day-to-day work becomes. Take a look here to see which options might be right for you.
Punkfish SSI Pro Training Team
Veronika Sievers
SSI Instructor Trainer and Technical Diver
Vero has been a full-time diving instructor and owner of Punkfish Diving on La Palma for 20 years now. In recent years, she has increasingly focused on diving instructor training, technical diving and, above all, diving theory.
In her life before diving, she studied social sciences and German as a teacher. A short break after her traineeship led to a completely different career path, but one that still has a lot to do with education.
Dominik Elsaesser
SSI DMI and astrophysicist at TU Dortmund University
On land, Dominik works as a scientist at TU Dortmund University, among other things in the field of gamma-ray astronomy. As La Palma not only has fantastic diving areas, but also excellent conditions for astronomical observations, there are also large telescopes for this energy range. So it was perhaps even foreseeable that at some point one could find the other, and Dominik discovered his passion for diving. This passion has not let go of him to this day, and so he trains punk fishermen with great enthusiasm on various topics, in theory just as much as in practice.
Angela Schreiter
Assistant Instructor Trainer and Base Manager of Punkfish Diving
Angela joined Punkfish Diving just in time for the move to Fuencaliente and has grown together with the new center to become the base manager.
With her years of experience as a full-time diving instructor, she trains up to Assistant Instructor and can teach many Specialty Instructor courses.
