The Way forward for Flying Instruction in the UK

[orionsbelt]

1 What is the way forward for flight instructing licencing in the UK?
2 GAPAN have an agenda and I attach an extract from the minutes of:-
EDUCATION & TRAINING COMMITTEE - REPORT TO COURT for March 2005
Instructors Sub-Committee:-
'Assistant Pooley has entered into an exchange of correspondence with the Chief Flight Examiner at the CAA concerning the requirements for the issue of a Flight Instructor rating. Some concerns had been expressed that this should not be a "tick in the box" exercise and that an appropriate course should be completed.'
3 At today's rates it costs around £17000 to qualify as a CPL/FI(R).
There is no minimum hours flown requirement or formal qualifications for entry other than to pass a simple flight test!
4 Should we differentiate between type of work carried out by F/I's
A) eg Small flying group / Unlicenced strip / Unpaid FI doing renewals, PPL training for group members / IMC etc. No trial lessons ( ie pleasure flights ). Group members being defined by being share holders / part A/C owners etc. Also should any hours flown in this environment count towards professional licences later?
What should be the FI qualifications for this role, - PPL /FI, 500hrs P1, FI Course, scaled down CPL theory Exams, Class 2 medical. Also should not NPPL training follow on these lines?
B) Busy local flying School operating 7 days a week. Should be as now, paid CPL/FI Class 1 medical but maybe should there be a minimum hours requirement of say 500hrs P1. I think the main issue is on trial lessons (pleasure flights ), The public must be flown by a professional licence holder. Should the role of BCPL F/I holder be redefined?
C) What do we do with professional flight training, Leave it as it is? Seems to work ok?
5 Think its time we all put our thoughts out in the open before 'others' do it for us!
Cheers
Orions***

[portsharbourflyer]

"500 hours p1 requirement to instruct". Never heard anything so rediculous in my life. This proposal would do more harm to the industry.


Well seen as though most instructors are fATPL holders using it as a method to build hours (please do not tell me people shouldn't use instructing as just as a method to build hours, because in the UK there aren't many other options) , once you introduce that rule hardly anyone is going to bother. Besides hour builders have provided the flight training industry with cheap labour for years.

Past obtaining the fATPL, another 400 hours p1 prior to the instructors rating, well at 40 pounds an hour (cheapest overseas rate for hour building), thats another 16000 for hour building, plus 5000 for the FIC course, now signing up for Eagle Jet starts to look like a better deal.

Remember in the CAA days there was a time where a PPL holder with 200 hours p1 was allowed to obtain an AFI rating without any additional exams, were things any less safe back then than they are now?

[BEagle]

AOPA has a far more realistic option for the future PPL instructor.....

Once the CAA gets off its backside and gets round to circulating the NPPL ANO amendment (it is now 34 months since the NPPL Policy and Steering Group agreed the proposal.....), the way ahead for the AOPA option will be clear.

This will effectively reintroduce the option for the rebirth of the PPL/FI qualification of yesteryear. 'Hours builders' could still exist - except that they would be able to 'build' before embarking on their CPL training provided that they had sufficient experience/aptitude to become FIs.

I agree that to 'upgrade' from FI(R) to FI should require a course and formal test as did the old UK AFI to FI requalification in pre-JAA times.

[portsharbourflyer]

Apologies if I misunderstood orions first post slightly, but the phrasing in the original post implied 500 hrs p1 required to instruct, rather than 500 hours p1 for removal of the restriction. In any case surely 500 hours of instructional time would still be a bit excessive for removal of the restriction. I do agree that an upgrade test is more sensible that the 25 solo sign off requirement (which with the practice of "passing on" students for signing off, the 25 solo signs offs can be quite meaningless).

[flybymike]

Beagle, Is it intended that the proposal to reinstate the old PPL/FI qualification will allow remuneration for instruction?

[BEagle]

It probably won't be the same as the old PPL/FI rating, but the intention is that NPPL and PPL level flight instruction may be conducted by FIs who do not hold commercial licences.

This probably won't happen before EASA takes over pilot licensing.

Remuneration should be an integral Rating privilege - rather than a Licence privilege - and FIs should only instruct up to the level of the licence they themselves hold.

[mad_jock]

BEagle whats EASA actually going to be resposable for in relation to the UK licensing?

Could it be that even if the UK want this change EASA can block it.

Presumably we can have a national veto on somethings? or can we.

In some respects it will do the training side of things good if they refuse training in none JAR countrys. what other changes will it bring?

[blagger]

BEagle,

Interested to hear more about the AOPA proposal. I'm guessing it centres around the CPL theor. knowledge requirement for the FI rating, rather than the CPL licence, as I think you can still have a PPL/FI now if you do the ground exams or have mil exemptions? I'm a couple of exams away from passing all my CPL exams with the sole aim of instructing and it has been a really long haul.

Do AOPA also have ideas about the FI course requirements? If not, would we not see floods of PPL instructors, and possible dilution of standards/instructional currency (as perhaps seen in the gliding world? not wanting to be critical there/jumped on - but there has always seemed to be loads of instructors in most clubs doing relatively few instructional hours to me).

[ProfChrisReed]

... would we not see floods of PPL instructors, and possible dilution of standards/instructional currency (as perhaps seen in the gliding world? not wanting to be critical there/jumped on - but there has always seemed to be loads of instructors in most clubs doing relatively few instructional hours to me).

The UK gliding world is very different from what I read here about powered flying instruction. There are almost no professional instructors (I'd guess fewer than 50) so almost all are volunteers. They also want to do their own flying, and so will inevitably have comparatively low hours.

In spite of this, I've never received poor instruction at a UK gliding club - it ranges from competent to excellent (though I'm sure there must be some poor instructors). The main reasons for this are:

1. A standardised instructing syllabus, which I believe is taken as the leading model world wide.

2. Regular checks on instructors. At my club instructors undergo structured training/checking on a regular basis with the CFI, and quite commonly fly with each other to brush up skills.

3. Hours are important, but so is what happens on each flight in instructional terms. At a winch only site, 20 hrs instructing might mean teaching 100 or more launches and landings. We pack quite a bit into each hour.

I suspect the most important of these is the standardised instructing syllabus. I've been reading the Stalling thread, and you would not find such a spread of views/techniques among gliding instructors. There is one consensus model of teaching stalling which is set out in the BGA Instructor's Handbook.