Large number of teenagers learning to fly

[heading 125]

At our flying club we are experiencing a large number of teenagers wanting to fly commercially. A few, as in previous years are very genuine and interested, but the others are usually accompanied by pushy parents and the person having the lesson is not really interested. They usually last about 10 lessons. Whilst it is good for business it is sole distroying when you do the brief and there is no interest returned. The worse one for me is during the flight there is little interest or amazement at what they are learning or seeing.
I suppose I should not complain in the current climate and it is probably down to TV progams like "Airline" etc. I must say that several non interested people are balanced by one young lad or lass who has saved their christmas/birthday money and really wants to fly and asks loads of questions and actually enjoys the flight.
Is this a common occurance around the rest of the country.

[DFC]

I have seen this a number of times before (you give a perfect patter and demo of something while they daydream out the left window) and if you think that it is bad that they give up after exercise 10 then you should try coping with one or two who manage to make it to 18!!!

Hours wandering round the planning room, wasting time chatting to every other student (and delaying their preparation)) then presenting themselves as being ready with no notams, no weather, no suitable plan or plog or flight plan despite this being the 6th or 7th time they have been shown what to do and taking 3 times the normal time allowed to prepare.

It is their money but you have to remember the required standards.

If they don't pay attention on exercise 6 for example then it is unlikely that they will meet the required standard at the end of the flight - so you do the same flight again.

By the 4th or perhaps 5th time they ask "why are we doing the same exercise every time?" and the response is "becasue you still can't demonstrate the minimum standard required to progress. This could be because of a lack of ability on your part or simply that you are not putting the required effort into the lesson. Which do you think it is?"

Even better if the pushy parents question the repeated lessons also because then you can jointly explain to student and sponsor that unless something changes the sponsor is wasting their money and the student is wasting their time.

You owe a duty to the sponsor to keep them informed of the lack of progress and the increasing cost to them and try to establish what they want to do as well as what the student wants.

Don't forget to keep immaculate student records (which are polite, correct and consistent) in these cases and keep the CFI / HoT well informed.

[Charlie Foxtrot India]

I have seen this often, parents saying "little Johnny has always wanted to be a pilot, he's so keen etc etc" when actually Johnny probably wants to be a lumberjack or something and is indifferent/terrified.

Yes it is unrewarding, and the hard part is when you tell the parent that Little Johnny hasn't gone solo yet because he hasn't learned the required skills because he's really REALLY not interested/terrified and he has told you that himself, they can get quite aggressive and be in complete denial... even while Johnny is curled up in the foetal position rocking in the corner at the thought of another flight...or perhaps the thought of Dad driving him home in the beemer and giving the lecture about how ungrateful he is...(I had the same dramas myself as a kid re. piano lessons when all I wanted to do was ride my horse)

I've tried to teach one girl who deliberately let go of the controls and folded her arms on short final every time because she didn't want to go solo. And a kid who deliberately got himself lost on his first solo nav to try and convince his parents he wasn't cut out to be a pilot. And STILL the parents wouldn't get it! Such a shame when there are other kids who are working thier butts off in McDonalds to pay for their lessons.

[Genghis the Engineer]

Up until a few years ago, I was heavily involved in a combined aviation/engineering degree course. It was fun to put together, and at times very rewarding.

But there were moments where I have a lot of sympathy for you chaps.

When they came to open days or for interview, the norm was that Jonnie wanted to be a pilot, but Mum and Dad wanted him to do a degree - so we were the compromise. The other thing was that in about 50% of cases, Jonnie's maths had been bringing the school too far down the league tables so he'd been persuaded to drop maths as early as possible. So, his maths was barely enough to handle PPL Nav, and totally inadequate to an engineering degree.

Once they arrived, the good ones would bond into a team pretty well and start helping each other. A reasonable number would join the UAS, thus ensuring that I got a reasonable number of invitations to RAF cocktail parties :ok:

Learning, we had three groups, of roughly equal sizes:

(1) Brilliant, worked hard, didn't make mistakes, listened, and we almost always got equally good reports from engineering and flying.

(2) Struggled with either flying or engineering, and usually a bit more enthusiastic about the flying than their degree. Usually however, learned to work, did okay, and supported each other.

(3) Got local part time jobs, skipped lectures, turned up late for flying, didn't bond with the other students. With luck, we'd weed these out at the end of the first year when they failed most of their exams.


Arrogance was common but not universal across all of the groups.



Ultimately however, it was definitely worth it and conversations with their flying instructors said the same thing. 2/3 of them would do well, once they'd had their backsides kicked a few times learned to turn up for lectures, read their groundschool, and prepare for flying lessons.

On the whole, I think that bringing teenagers into aviation is definitely far more good than bad.


I'm not sure I recognise the OP's reluctant flying students at-all. We had the keen ones, and a few who'd drifted into it because it sounded a good idea at the time, but none who appeared to actively dislike being there.

G

[Whopity]

The current expectation of teenagers is that you only have to attend and you get an A* Why should flying be any different!

The best students are the ones who bring themselves; the ones to watch are those brought by their parents whose expectations might be quite different to the student.

I recall the odd Flying Scholarship student who did not want to be there, what a waste, and one in particular whose single parent mother bitched about having to pay £100 towards 20 hours of free flying and 15 days accomodation!

Occasionally, we got some strange individuals who joined the RAF; one expected to be strapped into a Phantom and sent on his way; whilst others didn't want to shave or get out of bed in the morning. But we now know they used to put "failures" into the system to see how far they got. Generally, not very far!

[FlyingGasMain]

I've found teaching teenagers to be quite fascinating. You're teaching people who are still developing as personalities. One guy we had at our school started off as a very shy, quiet teenager but towards the end of his NPPL had become a confident pilot, well able to take good decisions.

The other thing about teenagers is some of them pick lessons up very quickly and you end up thinking 'bloody hell, I wish I'd been this good when I was learning'. Doesn't mean they've always got much common sense mind !

[fireflybob]

On the other hand, you never know what you might be starting - watch to the end, a great story!

Learning to Fly Transforms Your Life (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYH0P1TArSA&feature=channel)

[DFC]

The current expectation of teenagers is that you only have to attend and you get an A* Why should flying be any different!

I would not limit this overall group to that age bracket. Plenty 50 somethings turn up for flight training any try to apply the same level of preparation and study that they have been conditioned to apply to other things in their lives such as Microsoft software etc. No study required. Simply give it a go and when a problem arises consult the FAQ.

They just have to learn that in aviation the FAQ is called the confuser!!!

After a few hours it becomes clear that they are never going to get a decent return on their investment if they simply rely on having a go and the FAQ.

[barit1]

Is this much different from the 20s-30s-40s? During WWII MANY teens were trained and became combat pilots in their late teens. GWB (XLI) was a Naval Aviator at 18. I've seen kids of 14 getting their glider certificate. :)

[stevop21]

Thats funny. I've never seen anyone like that at my school (although I can't go a lot) I'm 16 and I've had 4 lessons and I absoloutly love it, unfortunatly can't afford anymore at the moment. I probably wouldn't notice them if they were my age. I guess the instructors view of another student would be totally different to mine. By the sounds of things there is bound to be 1 or 2

(I had the same dramas myself as a kid re. piano lessons when all I wanted to do was ride my horse)

This sounds very familiar!!! but for me it was flying

[VFE]

We were all young once and to be perfectly honest, if you had sat me in an aircraft at age 13 with a flying instructor I would've been hard pushed to focus any attention on the exercise in hand other than worrying about my life. For some youngsters it sits well, with others they couldn't care less.... it's part and parcel of being an instructor which you just get used to. The sooner you realise that you aren't going to be the defining factor as to whether they love it or hate it the sooner you start to relax and enjoy the flying yourself. You will never be able to impart your love of flying on to a disinterested youngster (or adult for that matter), it has to come from within the individual.

VFE.

[like_that]

How young is too young? I have recently taken on a student who is very young, at 13 years old he is the youngest I have had in my short time. And I had a really hard time accepting that he should be taught in this environment even with a tailored lesson plan.

He does really well, studies and know what I am talking about in the briefings. If it were up to me I would have convinced him to get his parents to open a savings account and hold that money until he was nearer to the solo age requirement. I then told them that obviously progress will be different to the normal standard and we came to an arrangement where he is to come in at a minimum of a month apart.

He and his parents were adamant that he learn and my senior instructors approved so training began.

The biggest problem I could foresee was the boy loosing his desire to fly (feeling the world does not want him to do this) or he will get to the stage where he is ready for solo however wont be able to...

Thoughts on this?

[fireflybob]

How young is too young?

Well my dad was a flying instructor and took me on my first flight when I was 7 years! By the time I got to my early teens I was doing circuits unassisted (and at night!). Far from getting bored with it, he gave me the enthusiasm and curiousity to go on to a career which (so far!) has spanned over 40 years in commercial aviation!

It's never too young to start learning and it also helps if you have good mentors.

[DFC]

Thoughts on this?


If you think that they might get bored now. Ask yourself how bored they will be when they have to repeat every single lesson and briefing again when they finally reach the age at which training towards the licence can be credited!

There is something seriously wrong with aviation these days.

I know lots of people who started "experiencing flying first hand" (rather than being trained) as young as this. Some even younger. However, none of them had formal flying lessons until they were much older.

I fear that in many places the idea of suggesting that they fly on some outings with established pilots and gain appropriate experience that way before tackling the formal lessons is dismissed because Mr and Mrs Parents are sitting there with the cheque book!!!

[like_that]

Try spacing it and having fun flights? Without trying to 'teach' too much?

[Captain Jock]

If you cannot teach someone to drive a car before they are 17 why are we trying to teach them to fly younger than this?

['India-Mike]

Red wine mode ON....

If you cannot teach someone to drive a car before they are 17 why are we trying to teach them to fly younger than this?

Irrelevant. Who's to say that teaching them to drive at 17 is appropriate?

I've been involved in the teaching of half-a-dozen teenagers to fly. My day job involves the teaching of 120 first year teenage aeronautical engineering undergraduates. I'd far rather do the former than the latter.

The latter I despair of - lazy, indolent, wanting to regurgitate rather than understand. Squeezing square knowledge pegs into round holes. Wanting an A for an A's sake, not because it's a reflection on their understanding or knowledge, but because it's an A. Appealing exam results because they don't like the grade point average implications.

The former have without exception been a joy, a pleasure and yes, dare I say it, an inspiration to teach. Keen, motivated, joyful at being airborne. Aware that flying is the real world and ultimately the buck will stop with them - no formulaic learning here - true assimilation of knowledge to enable understanding. What a difference. None of the youngsters I've flown with will appeal a debrief that doesn't suit them because they know that it's their life at stake not some daft exam score.

If they want to fly let them fly. Even if it means mum and dad paying rather than them sweeping a hangar floor to pay for it, or whatever the modern equivalent is. I imagine that those engaged in some vicarious parentallly-funded activity soon fall by the wayside anyway - but I've yet to meet such types.

As I said the ones I've worked with can be inspirational - growing as people because of a shared interest. Yes, they might want to go on to drive the latest fly-by-light computer-augmented wonderjet, but they're starting in the right way. At grass roots.

Gawd I sound like some bourgeois huggy-fluff rather than the reactionary dinosaur that I am. But there it is:ugh:

Red wine mode OFF