Your post attracts questions: If you are that interested in becoming an ATCO why not go straight for that?
ATC Assistants, or "Support staff" are a valuable part of the ATC team but what they do depends on where they work. At a busy NATS unit they will hold very responsible positions assisting the controllers with a myriad of tasks from supplying them with flight progress strips off the printer to working the airfield lighting systems. In between those tasks they may be liaising with adjacent airfields to pass clearances, fielding phone calls from the supervisor's desk, provide flight planning and briefing information to pilots and airlines, making routine weather observations, acting as radio operators on FIR frequencies.... etc, etc. And there are still a thousand things I haven't mentioned! Of course, at some small places they might just be dogsbodies who make tea for the AFISO......
In NATS the ATSA position is undoubtedly a step towards ATCO and evidence of dedication and efficiency in the role will be among the considerations by the Watch Manager when writing his recommendation.
How are they thought of?? Years ago there were "divisions" between the two ATC grades but that did not exist on the watches I worked on at Heathrow and West Drayton. I, and most of my colleagues, treated them as equals because most of them are spectacularly good at their jobs and we simply could not work without them.
Last edited by HEATHROW DIRECTOR; 26th Aug 2006 at 13:29.