Instructor Shortage.

[triadic]

Poor standards!

The standards these days are way below what they should be. With very few and perhaps notable exceptions:

A pilot passing a CPL today would not have passed a PPL 10 or 15 years ago

Why is this so?

Many interwoven reasons no doubt, but include:

• No minimum hours for instructing - I believe it should be >750hrs.
  
• No adequate supervision by CFI's
  
• Many sequences not taught as the instructor did not get taught it (too windy for x/w circuits!!!) yeah!
  
• No regular checks of students by CFI or A/CFI to test product
  
• CASA fails to understand what they have to regulate and FOIs don't do enough flying/tests.
  
• CASA fails to check CFIs and senior instructors and fails to apply appropriate standardisation
  
• Too many flying schools approved to do >CPL training = reduced standards

Why are these and the many other reasons behind generally poor standards and the failure of the regulator to address them? Easy: Commercial pressure

[autopilot_86]

Newbie??

Just Would Like To Know Where Does F Atpl Holders (200 - 250 Hours) End Up With A Job. I Am Aware That Minimum For Rex And Q Link Are 800 And 700 Hours Respectively. Does This Mean That F Atpl Holders Can Only End Up With An Instructing Job? Will It Be Possible For F Atpl Holders Ending Up With Rex Or Q Link If They Self Fund For A Saab 340 Or Dash 8 Type Rating? Thank You.

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

"A pilot passing a CPL today would not have passed a PPL 10 or 15 years ago"

Wow! And they reckon I'm opinionated!

I would probably insert "Some pilots" for "A pilot".

In the last couple of years I have flown with a few reasonably new PPLs and CPLs on long X-country trips that were quite "charter trip"-like.

I have been impressed with their professionalism and abilities.

Somebody out there is doing it well!

Dr

[Unhinged]

A pilot passing a CPL today would not have passed a PPL 10 or 15 years ago

* No minimum hours for instructing - I believe it should be >750hrs.
* No adequate supervision by CFI's
* Many sequences not taught as the instructor did not get taught it (too windy for x/w circuits!!!) yeah!
* No regular checks of students by CFI or A/CFI to test product
* CASA fails to understand what they have to regulate and FOIs don't do enough flying/tests.
* CASA fails to check CFIs and senior instructors and fails to apply appropriate standardisation
* Too many flying schools approved to do >CPL training = reduced standards

A bunch of wild opinions, factually incorrect, and deliberately made as dramatic as possible.

"No minimum hours for instructing" - In which universe is that ?
And as for the headline statement, what a load of old cobblers.

It's a wind up.

[kiwi chick]

I have said that it is not your qualification that makes you a good pilot, it is your skill and attitude, and most of that comes through experience.

If it was the qualification, then I would be as good a pilot as you (or any other IFR pilot) the day after I got my ticket. I don't think so. That ticket really only means that I am considered safe enough to go out there and learn.

Have to stick up for Walrus here - I've met some absolute tossers who have JUST scraped through a CPL flight test and there is no way I would like be called the same kind of pilot as them.

I believe experience, combined with the attitude, and training, all come together in many, MANY different ways - with the total package not always being the most desirable.

I think that skill and attitude count for a lot, I most of mine I am sure I gained through experience.

[404 Titan]

kiwi chick

I don’t think anyone has said we agree that “qualifications” makes a good pilot. What I have said and I will stand up and be counted for it is that in very few cases does “experience” on its own make a good pilot. I will say it again, what makes a good pilot is: (In this order)

1. solid training,
2. a mature attitude,
3. proper and thorough ongoing training and checking and
4. to a lesser extent, experience.

Fact, experience on its own without the others mentioned above generally makes a poor pilot.

[trolleydriver]

So just how would you define a "good pilot" ????

Is it a pilot that can;

Always land the smoothest?
Maintain the closest tolerance on an instrument approach?
Turn knife edge onto final and roll out on the centre line?
Make all their radio calls exactly right?
Conduct a forced landing onto a football field and walk away?

I agree with 404, but some things just can't be taught and you can't put an old head on young shoulders no matter how much training you give them. Relevant experience is what counts

[Kickatinalong]

What's the $$$

I'm grade 2 and My club pays just over $50.00/ hr in the air "$0" for briefs.I'm told that's the award, so we get award pay but not award conditions.
Kickatinalong

[triadic]

A bunch of wild opinions, factually incorrect, and deliberately made as dramatic as possible

.

Hate to disappoint you, but for some years now the product has been nowhere as good as it was in the 70's and 80's, and as I said “few and perhaps notable exceptions” my experience supports that view.

Sure there has always been those below par, but these days it seems if you have the $$ you can get your ticket in a cereal pack! There continues to be sequences that get a tick in the box, but the student has never done. Why is that so?

I would probably insert "Some pilots" for "A pilot".

Sure it was a broad based statement, but I suggest it is close to the mark and many senior instructors I have spoken with over the past year or two have agreed with me. If you have been around for a while, you would know!

Please tell me how many schools have their CFIs fly with their instructors and students on a regular basis? How else do you monitor standards? Many tests are a joke and no ATO should be permitted to test his own students, especially above PPL.

Raise the bar and make it harder for schools to get >CPL training approvals

[corowacomet]

"..Many tests are a joke and no ATO should be permitted to test his own students, especially above PPL..."
I have either had training at or contact with five schools over the years for CPL, IR, renewals etc and can honestly say that schools that conducted their own testing had higher standards than the ones using external ATOs. This is my own experience only but I think the difference was very noticable.
External ATOs can become 'attached' to one organisation if it provides enough work and if there was a run of failures it would be more likely that a new ATO would be found rather than it provoking soul searching from the CFI.
I know of one school CFI/ATO who would not be asked to test students from surrounding training organisations even though they were desperate purely because his standards were high and failure would be a forgone conclusion. Again this is my experience only however I would be very interested in what others have to say on the subject.
The Comet.

[Unhinged]

Hate to disappoint you

Not disappointed at all - Your post was a series of personal opinions without any facts, statistics or other hard evidence to back them up, so you couldn't possibly expect to be taken seriously.

many senior instructors I have spoken with over the past year or two have agreed with me

Well, this senior instructor doesn't (obviously), and nor do any of the other senior instructors that I talk to every week.

My PPL(A) test was 1991, CPL(A) was 1992, so that seems to qualify me as one of those uber-pilots who you think are so much better than the yoof of today. In fact, of course, we were no better or worse then than the PPLs/CPLs being trained today.

I don't know what your particular gripe is, but clearly something has got under your skin. If you set out the facts to support your case we can have a reasoned discussion. Until then it is just a bunch of wild opinions, factually incorrect, and deliberately made as dramatic as possible.

[triadic]

My PPL(A) test was 1991, CPL(A) was 1992, so that seems to qualify me as one of those uber-pilots who you think are so much better than the yoof of today. In fact, of course, we were no better or worse then than the PPLs/CPLs being trained today.

You are of course entitled to your opinion and you may even be one of the "exceptions" that I mentioned. But then you need to look back at least another decade or more before your time to be even able to compare!

My PPL & CPL were both obtained in the mid '60's, so obviously we are from different worlds. I had been instructing for 20yrs when you did your CPL and with all due respect it is my opinion based on experience and seeing the product change at the end of the sausage machine. The rot had set in even before your time! We are now in at least the 3rd or 4th generation of a breed of instructors that really don't know what they don't know and as a result then don't teach the things they don't know! Even many FOIs and airline C&Ters are in that boat. In the airlines, it is sound and strick SOPS that save the day. Standardisation if you like! Sadly it is missing from many schools and many GA organisations.

The most obvious one to compare over the years is "airmanship". There is certainly a very different view and priority given to such teachings these days.

But as another poster said

1. solid training,
2. a mature attitude,

is a good place to start. But he failed to mention "standardisation" which is were the regulator and others don't seem to see is missing these days!

[404 Titan]

triadic

I have to agree. I learnt to fly 22 years ago and looking back I can see that the rot with some of the schools was starting then. The only thing that saved the day then was that the DCA as it was then called did “ALL” the flight tests. No in-house flight test or freelance ATO’s. By the way while I didn't use the word “standardisation”, I did imply it in:

3. Proper and thorough ongoing training and checking.

[Flintstone]

Fascinating subject and I look back on my instructing time with fond memories but the thing that's bugging me is this..............


Autopliot_86, why do you start every word with a capital letter?

Just Would Like To Know Where Does F Atpl Holders (200 - 250 Hours) End Up With A Job. I Am Aware That Minimum For Rex And Q Link Are 800 And 700 Hours Respectively. Does This Mean That F Atpl Holders Can Only End Up With An Instructing Job? Will It Be Possible For F Atpl Holders Ending Up With Rex Or Q Link If They Self Fund For A Saab 340 Or Dash 8 Type Rating? Thank You.

[-_HowUdoiN_-]

triadic,

I am confused. If your saying the standard has dropped since the 60's and 80's, wouldn't that mean the 'good' pilots of these era's have created the 'poorer' quality product from their instruction techniques and or quality of testing? Why do you propose this has happened?

[GA Instructor 977]

Instructing Jobs

I dunno!
Yeah the pay is crap, but at the end of the day, what wages can the industry support.
I've been at both ends of the scale, my first boss paid me about $14000 for a year full time, but back then you considered yourself lucky to get a job with less than 500 hours. Now there are companies that do pay above the award, but they can't get people to relocate out of the major centres to work in a good job. The good jobs are not in the big cities, they are out bush with the smaller flying schools and charter companies!

[solowflyer]

If I had my time again I would definetly train with a smaller school. Did my PPL with a one man operation, we would quite often land on a beach somewhere or on an ag strip on a hill side. Then went on to do my CPL at a larger city flying school and they would not even let you land on an un sealed runway. Maybe its just me but I feel that I am alot better off from this previous training I had been given. Down with the sausage factories I say

[GA Instructor 977]

Smaller schools

I definitely think that the smaller operators give the best quality. Having been a Chief Pilot at a small (4 plane) "bush" op (so yes I am a little biased) we trained every student as if they were going to be flying into the same short, rough and hairy remote strips in the same indistinguishable terrain as we did on charter. The students all enjoyed the experience, which is a world removed from a 1000m grass/gravel level, no obstacle "ALA" that you will get from the sausage factories. I did my training partly at a small bush school, and spent way too much money being stuffed around at one of the sausage factories. When I see my old bush instructors today, they still remember me, but the instructors from the sausage factories have no idea. I was just a number! finishing my CPL and doing my FIR with a small school, I got serious one on one instructing, not just "next please".
Also as an employee at these sort of operators, I have learnt that you will definitely get appreciated more than if you are 1 of 20 junior instructors.

[sprocket check]

GA Instructor

I couldn't agree with you more. I trained in a single instructor operation away from the city, spent 4 hours driving each way for my lessons!! in comparison to the city schools, well there just isn't one. As you say, a number, they pass you on the street as if you were a complete stranger. Not to mention the time you spend in the air is 98% of your lesson, not 60% as in BK. The learning environment is critical and I think the smaller operators that take care of their students are more effective. I know for a fact that hour for hour you get twice as much out of a small country school than a major city one. And probably pay less for it...

[Walrus 7]

One operator hinted to me that smaller schools are facing another problem: training of CPLs. With the new multi crew license coming in, the airlines are looking for people with multi crew and multi engine time. Many smaller schools are also charter operators and the instructors double as charter pilots. Whereas that is likely to get them good twin time in Barons, Senecas or Navajos, it's usually single-pilot ops. The flying schools want their pilots to learn how to fly the thing alone, which is exactly what the airlines don't want.

Now that the big 'chain store' schools will be sending CPLs direct to the airlines to fly under the multi crew rules (I think QF have said they will take 100 from direct entry next year?), it's better for the CPL to learn at a 'chain store' than it is via a smaller school because they will start earning better money.

The result is a threatening shortage of both quality instructors and charter pilots at the smaller schools. Admittedly, QF have said that they will still take 300 through the GA path, but if the new ticket is successful, that will likely reverse in the future.

Solutions, opinions etcetera eagerly sought.

Walrus