I mean two, four hours sessions twice a year and what can one say they have really learnt? Or practised to perfection?
That is a significant part of the problem. Even conversion courses, where you’d think you’d get more of a chance to practice, have been reduced to the bare minimum. There are so many boxes to tick on the official form that this need starts taking over from structured learning; if you need a night landing, a single engine circuit, a hydraulic problem and a visual approach, the trend is to do them all in one, just to expedite the process. Get the paperwork sorted, then they can learn about the aircraft on the line, seems to be the unsaid objective.
I would like to see more time allocated to “free form” training/practice, as often the mandatories and pre-programmed exercises take up most of the detail. Being told there are 10mins left and asked if you’d like to do something at the end of a concentrated session often gets the reply: “yes, go home”, which is fair if the last 3hrs and 50mins have been chock full of action and there is little capacity left for learning. There is also the issue of when is anything you do in the sim non-jeopardy?