View Full Version : Freedom of Information Act & JAR questions
WX Man
9th Jan 2005, 18:33
Hey y'all...
Just thinking. With the new laws that came into force on 1st Jan concerning open access to government records, what is the chance of accessing the CAA's records on ATPL questions?
DJ Mixmaster
9th Jan 2005, 23:34
Slim to none I would think..
However if you need 'em, they're available to you on iwannabeapilot.com for some money of course.
RVR800
10th Jan 2005, 09:55
I think the questionbank may fall under the public interest exclusion tag. You can ask.
However, as far as exam feedback is concerned the CAA have a position that is at best unhelpful.. and at worst in contravention of the law
LASORS (EXAMS).... 'The CAA cannot enter into correspondence...'
Actually they HAVE to respond to requests for information - its the LAW and as a UK public body they must comply. If they dont you can report them to the Information Commisioner.
Also after stumping up hundreds of pounds it is reasonable, in my view, to have some feedback - is it not .............?
Mosspigs
10th Jan 2005, 13:12
The FoI act allows access to specific files, it is not , sadly, an invitation to browse.
As the questions are on a databank and not a file, I think we are out of luck.
Further to this, would it ever be possible to have access to exams that you have already sat and failed eg. I scored 74% in Gen Nav 1st time around. It would be so much easier to debrief an exam and prepare for a resit if you actually knew where you had gone wrong.
thereceiver2004
11th Jan 2005, 18:25
makes me laugh.. in the human perfomance exam material and notes.. many refererences are made to feedback being positive, a good thing and something needed throughout the life of a pilot... BUT
the leader of pilots in the UK refuses to heed its own advice
he he he he :D
xbilz
11th Jan 2005, 19:53
Has anyone been intouch with CAA on the queries that were one of the main concerns before this information act i.e. Pass rate, issue of licenses and empolyment ratio of integrated & modular students.
I might drop them an email to try my luck !!!
Vee One...Rotate
12th Jan 2005, 12:13
Speaking of the FOIA, I think it'd be VERY interesting to find some black and white statistics on destinations of those completing professional flight training from certain schools...if only to confirm the marketing hype is at best - slightly exaggerated, at worst - plain misleading...!
V1R
Send Clowns
12th Jan 2005, 15:59
As the questions are on a databank and not a file, I think we are out of luck.Is the form of information really relevant? I'd be surprised, and it would be a great dodge for officials. In this case, however, since the papers must be printed, surely you could ask for that information. It is also an offense to destroy information to prevent it from being released, so they would have to keep a copy, and then answer each request with a valid reason not to release the copy...
acw350
12th Jan 2005, 20:32
After having sat some exams at the start of the month i was amazed at the "secret" way in which the CAA conduct the exams. You must not remove any material from the exams even a blank bit of paper with your sodding name on it. After having worked for the flammin goverment for years i went to numerous talks on the " data protection act". As far as i could remember if a government body has your name on something you are well entitled to see this document and as someone has said if they say they have shredded it for eg then they are wrong. So for £55 of hard earned cash from the gov't i would like to challenge the CAA to let us have the proper feedback from exams as they get far too much money from all of us students as it is. After all you do print and sign your name on each exam, so technically it is a record of you so therefore the government "CAA" should under this act release it to you ( and free of charge !!!!) .
So if anyone is interested in challenging the CAA or knows of anyother info then pls feel free to msg me with your ideas or comments.
Send Clowns
13th Jan 2005, 11:17
The data protection act only applies to records held on computer, but the freedom of information act doesn't. Try this now.
buster172
13th Jan 2005, 21:27
acw350,
I would sign the petition! Check your Pm's
Regards,
Buster172
RVR800
14th Jan 2005, 08:28
The way the theory summative assessments for JAA pilots is performed is now well out of date. What do I mean by that?: well good practice in teaching and learning advises such assessments should always be followed by feedback.
The reason its not done is for the convenience of the CAA,
On a related topic I would be interested to know upon which evidence base the JAA built the requirement for a 36 month acceptance period for licence issue? Or is it (as I suspect) just a device to get you to spend your money quickly.....?
Forward Slip
14th Jan 2005, 09:34
Quit harping on about it and study the subjects!
3offthe tee
14th Jan 2005, 11:30
Well said Forward Slip - a bit of hard work to UNDERSTAND the subject, and you shouldn't be anywhere near 74%......
Guess you guys are great and understand everything you read?
Never had a difficult day or any personal problems, which may cause you to under perform on the day.
Well done, Im impressed.
I have had 74% on an exam and it's really frustrating when you find that particular subject difficult already and you are so close, a little feedback would not go a miss!
I would love to of breezed through all 14 subjects but I did find some harder than others.
Wanting to know where you went wrong would help you better understand.
People state that if you only pass at 75% you only know ¾ of the material, bo!!ocks.
When was the last time you went into an exam and they tested everything?
I hated grid Nav and struggled on it, Thankfully it was not in my exam, would I have scored less if it were in the exam, yes, would this make me a worse pilot? Do they ever use it in real life, how likely am I to ever use it?
Questions go on, Study to the best of your ability and hope for a good set of questions, Nobody can be good at everything
I doubt we will ever get the CAA to give the desired feedback.
WX Man
15th Jan 2005, 10:52
Forward Slip....
With so much irrelevant material in the syllabus, learning the answer to the question can only be a good thing. You regurgitate, you pass the exam, you forget.
What you NEED to keep hold of is the relavent stuff. I don't know about you, but I worked my ar*e off, got a first time passes and bloody good results, understood all the sh*te and then promptly dumped most of it.
THAT'S why we need it! If the bleeding JAA hadn't put so much detail in about, ooooh, let's say... Loop and sense aerials... then I would, definately, quit 'harping on' about it.
My goodness there are some very elitist attitudes displayed on this site from time to time. I personally found some of the ATPL study to be very dense and lets not forget that not everyone has a rich academic background before the study starts. Add to this holding down a full time job and family and you may start to see that no matter how much effort you put it in it's sometimes just not your day.
I really do hope that you do not take these kinds of attitudes into the cockpit with you because some of us 74%ers may be unfortunate enough to sit next to you for 8 hrs a day and be told how much better pilots than us you are as well.
:(
WX Man
16th Jan 2005, 09:07
Duir...
Please don't misunderstand the gyst of my comment! I REALLY take my hat off to guys like you who hold down full time jobs whilst studying via Distance Learning. I know that I couldn't do that, I'm just in the fortunate position where, following the termination of a fairly lucrative job abroad, I could afford to devote 6 months to a full time course (providing I took the 1 month in between the modules with a temp job). Guys who achieve 14 ATPL subjects whilst doing it via DL, and not suspending everything else in their life, deserve a medal IMO.
The point I was trying to make was that I advocate learning the answer to the questions, when irrelevant material is concerned. Which is why it would be very useful to lobby the JAA, via our ever-so-approachable, forward thinking, customer-orientated friends in Aviation House.
(I can cite a publication of a few years ago, which emanated from a working group of European airlines which proposed radical changes to the ATPL syllabus. Very few of these changes were initiated, due in part to the inertia that 33(?) member states have).
Okay old chap no hard feelings....rant over.
It's just so hard to make sense of the ATPLs sometimes as pass rates and percentages do not seem to follow any logical path.
I do think that if you have been away from academic learning for a long time as I have the first lot of ATPLs is a real shock to the system. However having sat the next Module with Bristol in December I passed all first time. Maybe it is just getting used to learning again after Module 1 that helps.
Its not that I am suggesting we should be given all the answers in advance, more that if I had feedback on where I personally went wrong then I could really work on more in depth learning of those particular areas.
Let's not forget that on my Module 1 there was at least 1 current Airline F/O that I sat my exams with who also didn't pass some subjects hence giving a good indication as to their relevence to the real world of flying.