Waves Project Inc

We are professional SCUBA diving instructors and other individuals with a strong passion to give back to wounded veterans. The men and women who served this country and came home with traumatic wounds, amputations or other life changing injuries; as well as their families, deserve the opportunity to experience what SCUBA diving offers.

The Waves Project has been established to provide an opportunity for Wounded American Veterans and those with service connected disabilities along with their families to experience scuba diving. Scuba diving can help the wounded warrior by promoting independence and self-confidence in many ways. The wounded veteran will benefit from becoming an underwater equal to able bodied divers and discover new personal goals and opportunities. They will also enjoy the peace and relaxation achieved by the weightlessness that our silent world provides. Through reduced external influences, scuba diving allows them to concentrate on less painful recovery and rehabilitation.

The Waves Project helps American Veterans with disabilities participate in a challenging, exciting and rewarding sport designed to facilitate the rehabilitation process of their injuries as well as rehabilitating the entire family unit. Unlike most veteran organizations that focus on serving the veteran only, WAVES Project encourages the veteran's entire family and friends to be a part of the process, creating a true rehabilitation for the entire family.

Aquatic therapy takes advantage of the properties of water and weightlessness, to provide a unique exercise and therapeutic environment for patients who experience pain, weakness, muscle spasms, limited range of motion and decreased strength.

In addition to basic SCUBA diving training we hold a monthly dive club meeting with is both social and a little business. We encourage participants to be involved in fun dive days as well as help with community outreach. One goal is to schedule and have funding to pay for veterans to take part in at least one fun dive day every month to encourage bonding and keep those we have trained active in the sport. We ask those who have participated to attend mixers and events to help spread the word about how this program has helped them and their families. All these activities help us build a community of divers who share common experiences and learn to rely on each other.

We have started a new program called "mission oriented diving" where veterans are trained to work as volunteers with the National Park Service Submerged Resource Center. They are conducting maintenance, research and conservation in our underwater parks giving the veterans a purpose for diving. They are volunteering to serve our country in a new way since they are unable to continue serving in the military.

We have 4 SCUBA instructors who have been trained by the HSA - Handicap SCUBA Association to work with divers with disabilities. In addition we have eight dive masters and two assistant instructors who assist the instructors. We continue to train dive professionals to meet the growing demand for services. Our core group of 60 volunteers have remained committed and active for the past 7 years giving us consistency and reliability.
Our paid staff consists of a program manager, director of operations, fundraising professional and bookkeeper.They handle day to day operations, scheduling of classes, equipment maintenance, volunteer management and administrative duties.
In March of 2020 we moved into office space in giving us a dedicated classroom, room to service equipment, SCUBA Gear display area and the space to store our SCUBA equipment. There is also a large meeting room for veterans to gather for training and camaraderie.
In 2019 our leadership development program successfully trained veterans to be dive masters and instructors to take over training courses. We will continue this program to further meet the growing demands for our programs. We have a backlog of about 150 applicants who are waiting to join the program. Two veterans have been fully trained to service our SCUBA equipment and three others are being trained to assist with that aspect of the organization.

We have successfully trained and certified three paralyzed veterans as Open Water SCUBA Divers. This is important because it demonstrates our abilities and competence to other veterans who may be apprehensive about taking the training. Four veterans with multiple limb amputations have completed the SCUBA certification process.

Each year we subsidize 12 veterans to take a week long diving trip that included additional training as well as honing their skills. During that week they learn new skills and achieve milestones. We issued dozens of specialty certifications and qualify divers to participate in the Mission Oriented Diving projects with the National Park Service. All of this training helps build confidence and improves skill levels for a lifetime of diving.