Now THAT'S going to get a few
Here's one
<rant ON>
Welcome to line training Msjj. Just because you live in Brissy and fly from a sunny airport, no doubt with shiny shoes and pressed uniform doesn't mean everyone else in the world does. There are people who don't know where to go because their instructors abandoned them for money and they ended up with five "full time" instructors before their PPL, and there are some who had the "luxury" of one or two on the way to CPL. Either way, it doesn't make a difference to how well they fly, or instruct, and NEITHER DOES MONEY (above a certain "survivability" limit).
The amount of information absorbed by the student and the quality of their flying relates to the instructor's pay how? That is surely our benchmark, the ability of the student after 5 hours to go solo, to glide it in from almost anywhere, to actually put it right down in a FLWOP and stop before the fence at the other end.
It looks like you *might* be the only one being paid the award rate (which is double mine). That doesn't mean you're earning it. And it sure as hell doesn't mean your company is the only one of all of ours that should be operating! Some food for thought - if there were no GA operators operating any more because they could only afford one Instructor and a Boss who are then overstressed sending people solo while flying at the same time, where would you go for your cross countries? Do you honestly think that there would be many little unattended airports left? I know ours certainly wouldn't be, and we've got two runways and two reasonably large training organisations here. If we were both forced to pay over $30/hr, even just $30/flying hour, not duty hours, the airport would probably not exist in ten years time. As it is it's tenuous, and the people who run organisations (eg aeroclubs) who can afford bloody good instructors but can't pay them in money deserve more than being told what to spend their money on by someone who doesn't live on some food, lots of fresh air and freedom. For example, our Chief Flying instructor doesn't have annual holidays, and he's been and gone before 0800 almost every morning to keep the ship running. The two part timers here (including me) get enough flying to keep current in eight types, and a freebie now and then. That's the kind of place and person I want to work for, not someone who thinks people are personnel. You can have your money if it's that important to you, I'll have the Cub rating, the Tiger Moth rating, the scenics, the good students who pay for it themselves, the club trips and competitions, the hangar parties, the quite comfortable couch by the kitchen. If I ever get tired of this (how?), then I'll go fly for someone else who has fun flying. But pay is a threshold for me - enough to keep me going at the moment and the fun and work don't stop. The Law is there for guidance, not rigid adherence. If the cops were called to every single violation of every rule, we would need to pay another 20% more police because there is simply too much. Same with instructing, it's only the real screwballs that are consistently dangerous and they're easy to spot. </rant OFF>
Safe flying (and fun!)
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Confident, cocky, lazy, dead.