Instructors----where Are They????

[schoolboy]

Following on from the "MECIR or instructors rating" thread, where the BL***Y HELL are these instructors?

Sure there are a few (and I mean FEW) grade 3's with really low hours out there who are looking to progress through the ranks to grade 1, but that just about pulls it up. It's a sorry state of affairs to think just where our industry will end up if the only reason a newby pilot is only using the instructor rating to get hours and then move on to bigger (and better????) things. One starts to wonder if there will ever be good quality, well qualified, good flying time teachers in the not too distant future? Certainly indications are that the direction we are heading will leave us with 70y/o grade 1's and jack s**t of any thing else with experience. Do we want the training regime to end up like the LAME scene? When was the last time you saw an experienced 30/40 y/o LAME? Sure there are a few, but like the grade 1 & 2 instructors, only a few!

It's not hard to peer into the future and see we will simply not be able to offer the expertise or number of good instructors to meet the demand.

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[THE CONTRACTOR]

Schoolboy, I agree with you. I absolutely love instructing, I am 34 or something which I consider to be young, (well not old anyhow). I would stay in GA instructing if I could but the fact of the matter is I have a Wife and Kid to support. At some point I must stop spending so much FU$%ING MONEY on paying for my own renewals and get a job that at least pays a decent wage. Until the conditions upwardly spiral as the housing market did in QLD 3 Years ago, I suspect no one will stay instructing for any great length of time.

[turbantime]

Another problem is the fact that instructional hours are almost considered useless by the airlines apart from Qantas of course who have hired quite a few.

I am a Grade 1 instructor with M/E training approval and would have loved to stay in the field as my boss paid me quite well but the reality was that to progress through my career I had to get a charter gig.

And before the non-instructors get on this forum and start "instructor bashing" I would like to add that in my opinion instucting is the most demanding type of flying I have undertaken. My experience ranges not only from instructing but also single and multi engine vfr/ifr charter and multi-crew turbine ops.

It always amuses me when people that have never done an instructor rating start to talk about how inadequate instructional hours are and how they consider themselves better pilots and best of all talk about how an instructor "needs to start from scratch" in the charter world because they won't know what to do.

I know of a few instructors out there that have left the field to persue their goals and that's the way it'll be until there's a general change of attitude towards instructors.

[Hugh Jarse]

The sad truth, Schoolboy, is that people have been using instructing (well, GA in general) as a stepping stone since Pontius was a Pilate.

Regardless of whether an individual follows the Instructing or Charter path, the fact of the matter is that the key reason people move on from GA is twofold:


They have the ultimate goal of working in the airline environment; and/or
GA, with the exception of very few instances, offers little in the way of career prospects/remuneration.Speaking from firsthand experience (or that of friends), with the exception (once again) of a handful of operators, the majority of instructors:


Are employed on casual wages, or worse still on a "contract" basis, with conditions below the GA award, even when they are working on flying school premises fulltime (see below);
Are required to be on the school premises fulltime (even when they have no flying that day) UNPAID. This precludes a second job which may be necessary;
Are required to carry out other tasks, such as clerical, reception and others which are unrelated to the duty of actually being a flying instructor UNPAID;
Do not receive award entitlements, such as superannuation or leave entitlements;
Required to pay for renewals and upgrades.
I could go on, but I'm sure you get my drift. Most instructors are expected to behave like fulltime employees, but without any of the benefits or award entitlements. The Contractor hit the nail on the head.

I was one of the lucky ones who was employed fulltime at a major college, and was treated well by my employer. However, even on the award it would not have paid enough to service a mortgage in SY and feed the family. And that was over 10 years ago! I can't imagine how difficult it would be now :suspect:

So, Schoolboy, you'll never stop those who want to move on. For the remainder that see GA as worthwhile, well they'll just move on anyway (often to leave aviation altogether), because it's just not worth it. You can thank the industry for that. The only way you'll retain the second group is for employers to offer conditions that will make people WANT to stay....:cool:

[Wheeler]

So its really easy for a grade 3 to find work then?

Even those who are willing to be paid only by the casual flying hour and wait around doing any kind of odd job (for free) around the place just in case a punter comes in the door for trial flight find it difficult to get a start.

Lets be realistic, there are plenty of young G3's around who are more than willing to be exploited who cannot get much of a start and when they do its a real struggle. No surprise an industry like that is on its way out.

And as for LAME's, there are quite a few of them willing to cut eachother's throats to get the odd the customer. How many time have you heard ' the last bloke did this wrong and this needed doing etc etc. Aren't you lucky I saved you from him?'

The truth is the industry is contracting - and probably destroying itself through what the MBA'a call 'destructive rivalry'. The we CASA coming up with so called 'user pays'. That will really help!

[schoolboy]

Contractor,
NEGOTIATE! There are employers who will agree to pay for renewals, and they will pay decent wages and offer good conditions. You can only be told to P**S OFF if your demands don't suit, but if you are any good and appear to be an asset to a company, the odds are you will get what you want. We both agree that the numbers of grade 1 & 2 instructors are dwindling, so use that to get e decent package.

turbantime,
As I questioned "bigger (and better????)", must have got to you too!
I agree, in my opinion also (and it is a humble opinion), "instructing is the most demanding flying", and those who hang in must be dedicated and love their vocation (OK, I understand no bread/milk if no $).

Hugh Jarse,
Lots of points made, and some make sense, but why denigrate the whole industry with broad statements? Surely some instrucrors are doing allright (and I know this for a fact!). I'm not saying $747, but pretty good considering. We can't all achieve what we want, no matter how hard we try, but compromise sometimes yields good job satisfaction and more than enough to keep mum, the kids and the mortgage happy.

Wheeler,
Predictable attitudes bring predictable results!
Through innuendo you too have sullied the people who do the right thing. I didn't question the ethics of LAME's, only the system that has allowed their numbers to be threatened. If you don't employ youth, eventually you don't have experience. Dosn't attrition come into instructors as well as LAME's longievity?
As for "user pays", get over it! Accept the system, whether right or wrong, and learn to work with it and use it to the best advantage. Believe it or not, there are contractors (of all sorts) who, by good negotiation, are doing OK (I KNOW!)

[THE CONTRACTOR]

Shoolboy, When I finally get the hours for my Grade 1 and my Multi Training approval, that is what I plan to do. The hard part is convincing people that I am in for the long run and not another grade 3 hour builder. Not that there is anything wrong with hour building it's just that operators use them to their advantage.

[planemad_bk]

I remember there were a few schools around BK which were quite good to work for, but that was a few years ago now. Since i've been in charter for quite a while i've been out of the instructing scene for a while now.
What are the 'good' flying schools to work for around BK these days?

[C152R]

As the man says where are they?

[Kickatinalong]

Schoies are still paying the award rate. with Super & W/comp.:ok: :ok: :ok:
Kickatinalong

[theflyer1735]

Am I being to cut and dried to think that this is the way it is and will always be?

The majority of instructors that I know have a real passion for teaching and would seriously consider making it there career if the money was even remotely close to what you could earn with even the lowest paid airline companies. (not everything is about money I know but lets face the commercial reality of the situation presented to most individuals.. Kids, houses etc)

Here in lies the problem, in order to keep the good instructors instructing they need to make more money, so they go to there employer and negotiate a package which makes it worth there while to stay. As a result the employers costs are higher due to the increase in his wages bill. For it feasable for him to run a profitable business he needs to pass this cost on to the students. Less and less students are then able to fly due to the cost and GA in in OZ dies a slow death.

I am not saying it is right, as a matter of fact I think that it stinks but I just dont see a way around it that has any life. :{

[ani tayas]

Hey guys,

Not sure if you've been following the thread "instructor job going down south", but apprears there is another place offering heaps of flying with a good salary package for new instructors..........

..........but they seem to be struggling to fill it......??

Hence the question again, where are they???? :confused:

[Wheeler]

Great stuff this economic rationalism!

User pays and if the user cannot pay, then the industry can go to buggery.

Some great comments in a similar vein on another forum about BK airport.

Simplistic user pays, (government sitting on their hannds) does not take into account the cost to the community - and hence we will have no training or charter businesses or GA airfields left in a few more years... - and of course no pilots and Lames either. Then governments might just notice the fall out on businesses that rely on GA - like Mining?

Average Helicopter pilot age is 48, average helicopter engineer is 52. Not much training going on there recently, in a sector that is projected to double in the next few years.... Now how can that be?

[novicef]

Well it appears an instructors rating might not be the way to go. From what I'm reading here there's a glut of low time instructors and even when schools advertise for more senior instructors they aren't getting many replies due to the poor working conditions.