Flight school now and pay later has to stop
Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Australia
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Straight from the website
You are eligible for FEE-HELP if you:
1)are studying at an approved FEE-HELP provider (approved provider) or through Open Universities Australia (OUA);
2)meet the citizenship and residency requirements:
a: you are an Australian citizen or permanent humanitarian visa holder (resident in Australia for the duration of your unit), OR
b: you are a permanent visa holder who is undertaking bridging study for overseas-trained professionals, and will be resident in Australia for the duration of the study;
pretty much for citizens it seems, But not excluded to foreign nationals who have become Aussie citizens. Wonder how this works out for kiwis?
1)are studying at an approved FEE-HELP provider (approved provider) or through Open Universities Australia (OUA);
2)meet the citizenship and residency requirements:
a: you are an Australian citizen or permanent humanitarian visa holder (resident in Australia for the duration of your unit), OR
b: you are a permanent visa holder who is undertaking bridging study for overseas-trained professionals, and will be resident in Australia for the duration of the study;
pretty much for citizens it seems, But not excluded to foreign nationals who have become Aussie citizens. Wonder how this works out for kiwis?
I heard a rumor that three International Students, one from Malaysia the other two from India (who just qualified for citizenship) recently put all of their advanced training onto FEE-HELP and then left the country once completed.
They suspend your driver's license if you have unfaid fines.
Join Date: Mar 2012
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I heard a rumor that three International Students, one from Malaysia the other two from India (who just qualified for citizenship) recently put all of their advanced training onto FEE-HELP and then left the country once completed. I hope it isn't true and that there are measures in place to not allow this kind of abuse of assistance.
To be honest, I don't really see a problem with the fact that you can get access to FEE-HELP for pilot training (because you do have to pay it off eventually), but it just pisses me off with the way universities operate and and sell courses to naive high school graduates.
For the people who say commerce/engineering degrees cost $100k, they roughly cost around the $30k to $60k mark (thats coming from my children who have graduated in the past few years), so a lot less that one of these aviation degrees that cost around the $90k to $110k mark.
Some of us seem to talk about atars, in my opinion I can see the benefits of it, but I don't think it's necessarily a true reflection of how smart/capable a student really is. Lets face it, most kids seem to just rote learn everything in the hsc
In saying that, I left high school at the end of year 10 to do an airframes and engine apprenticeship at Qantas, but I have since completed an aerospace engineering degree from a university which requires an atar of 98 for that course when I last checked and to be honest I definitely wasn't the brightest kid back at high school. I don't really see anything wrong with someone entering a course that doesn't quite have the atar, as long as they pass at the end of the day, that all that matters right?
Just from attending university open days with my children it just pisses me off with the way universities sell their courses (not just aviation courses) to naive year 11/12 students, and just how inaccurate and bull**** the stuff that comes out of their mouths on university open days. The thing that makes it even worse is the naive students and their parents not even bothering to do their own research the job prospects of some of these particular industries and just believe every single thing the universities advertise. (Because there are plenty of degrees at university that have worse job prospects than a bloody aviation degree)
I remember a couple of years ago, my son and i went to an open day at UNSW for their aviation degree and one of the lectures there claimed that a few of there graduates in 2011 had got jobs at Qantas as a380 second officers straight out of university and I reckon 99% of the people in the room were all like "wow" and didn't even think that it was bull****.
For the people who say commerce/engineering degrees cost $100k, they roughly cost around the $30k to $60k mark (thats coming from my children who have graduated in the past few years), so a lot less that one of these aviation degrees that cost around the $90k to $110k mark.
Some of us seem to talk about atars, in my opinion I can see the benefits of it, but I don't think it's necessarily a true reflection of how smart/capable a student really is. Lets face it, most kids seem to just rote learn everything in the hsc
In saying that, I left high school at the end of year 10 to do an airframes and engine apprenticeship at Qantas, but I have since completed an aerospace engineering degree from a university which requires an atar of 98 for that course when I last checked and to be honest I definitely wasn't the brightest kid back at high school. I don't really see anything wrong with someone entering a course that doesn't quite have the atar, as long as they pass at the end of the day, that all that matters right?Just from attending university open days with my children it just pisses me off with the way universities sell their courses (not just aviation courses) to naive year 11/12 students, and just how inaccurate and bull**** the stuff that comes out of their mouths on university open days. The thing that makes it even worse is the naive students and their parents not even bothering to do their own research the job prospects of some of these particular industries and just believe every single thing the universities advertise. (Because there are plenty of degrees at university that have worse job prospects than a bloody aviation degree)
I remember a couple of years ago, my son and i went to an open day at UNSW for their aviation degree and one of the lectures there claimed that a few of there graduates in 2011 had got jobs at Qantas as a380 second officers straight out of university
and I reckon 99% of the people in the room were all like "wow" and didn't even think that it was bull****.
I agree with DancingDog and might be able to introduce a little bit of extra information.
I did the first semester of the Griffith University Course a few years ago. It was during a course of Quantum Mechanics that, whilst being very interesting, I realised most of the courses we were doing and paying for were utterly useless!! I personally found that to be one of the biggest issues, they get you to do all these other utterly useless courses simply to fill requirements for it to be a University Course, it was far cheaper and faster, thusly more efficient, for me to just go do it the old fashioned way out at my local Aerodrome.
For example, I finished my flight training, unfortunately right at the start of the GFC making it an exceptionally bad time to go looking for a job, took me approximately 21months to finally find a full time job (Did some casual odds and ends in between though), I was in this job for almost a year when a group of students came through doing a fly through and I got chatting to them. Turned out they had started a semester before me and out of the 6 of them only 1 had a CPL and the others were about a year away from completing their courses!!! So essentially having started Uni 6 months after them I was a few years ahead of them by avoiding the Uni Course.
I also observed a LOT of what DancingDog described, too many people who do it because it sounds like a bit of a lark with no real idea what they are getting in to. This was mainly due to them not doing a lot of research beforehand because:
A. It had a low entry score so they didn't really need to try too hard to get in
B. It was on HECS so therefore they weren't up for payment straight away and could put it to the back of their minds!!
In my mind they need to raise the scores, not because it really requires a higher intelligence (I highly agree with those who describe it more like a trade!) but so that it puts off those doing it just for the fun of it and make it something that people actually aim towards doing like a Medical Degree, you don't find many in a Medical Degree who will tell you "Oh, I got a high enough score so I figured I'd give it a go...", they all aimed to be there!
Honestly, I see nothing wrong with gaining a University Degree as a Pilot (Not too keen on this new thing about "Requiring" a degree for some airlines now) but I wouldn't recommend doing the Aviation Degrees, I'd recommend something to do with Business, Finance or IT as a backup incase it all goes tits up.
I did the first semester of the Griffith University Course a few years ago. It was during a course of Quantum Mechanics that, whilst being very interesting, I realised most of the courses we were doing and paying for were utterly useless!! I personally found that to be one of the biggest issues, they get you to do all these other utterly useless courses simply to fill requirements for it to be a University Course, it was far cheaper and faster, thusly more efficient, for me to just go do it the old fashioned way out at my local Aerodrome.
For example, I finished my flight training, unfortunately right at the start of the GFC making it an exceptionally bad time to go looking for a job, took me approximately 21months to finally find a full time job (Did some casual odds and ends in between though), I was in this job for almost a year when a group of students came through doing a fly through and I got chatting to them. Turned out they had started a semester before me and out of the 6 of them only 1 had a CPL and the others were about a year away from completing their courses!!! So essentially having started Uni 6 months after them I was a few years ahead of them by avoiding the Uni Course.
I also observed a LOT of what DancingDog described, too many people who do it because it sounds like a bit of a lark with no real idea what they are getting in to. This was mainly due to them not doing a lot of research beforehand because:
A. It had a low entry score so they didn't really need to try too hard to get in
B. It was on HECS so therefore they weren't up for payment straight away and could put it to the back of their minds!!
In my mind they need to raise the scores, not because it really requires a higher intelligence (I highly agree with those who describe it more like a trade!) but so that it puts off those doing it just for the fun of it and make it something that people actually aim towards doing like a Medical Degree, you don't find many in a Medical Degree who will tell you "Oh, I got a high enough score so I figured I'd give it a go...", they all aimed to be there!
Honestly, I see nothing wrong with gaining a University Degree as a Pilot (Not too keen on this new thing about "Requiring" a degree for some airlines now) but I wouldn't recommend doing the Aviation Degrees, I'd recommend something to do with Business, Finance or IT as a backup incase it all goes tits up.
Join Date: Apr 2012
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Ixixly, I enjoyed reading your post and the comments from Dancing Dog - pretty much on the ball. One thing I do want to correct, though. I've been a practising engineer and academic, in several parts of the world, for about 30 years. Quite often I've been presented with an unhappy young person, typically 1-2 years into a course, whose response to my question "why did you do engineering/medicine/...." is "because I had the marks". And it's actually more common in the courses with highly competitive entry requirements. Despite what people often think at the time, the situation is frequently redeemable. Provided there is a bit of support, we can usually do both the student and the world a favour and help him/her move on.
I'd also like to put in a vote for educated pilots, or educated anybody, really. Looking at Australia's (sliding) ranking in any number of indicators, including some key science and technology metrics, makes pretty depressing reading. One of the European cities in which I worked built a university in the early 17th century to prevent themselves "perishing from ignorance and barbarism". Plenty of that around even today, I'd venture. Of all the things the government can blow your ATP dollar on, education is one of the better investments.
Just an observation on the subject of schools. The comments about the public/private nature of the school being irrelevant are pretty much on the ball in my experience, especially by the time you start looking at graduate student or professional performance. The main thing is to look for a school that offers core courses at advanced levels, and encourages students to undertake the more rigorous options. Parents can do a lot more in this area, too. Veggie maths and physics are not what you want in 2014.
I'd also like to put in a vote for educated pilots, or educated anybody, really. Looking at Australia's (sliding) ranking in any number of indicators, including some key science and technology metrics, makes pretty depressing reading. One of the European cities in which I worked built a university in the early 17th century to prevent themselves "perishing from ignorance and barbarism". Plenty of that around even today, I'd venture. Of all the things the government can blow your ATP dollar on, education is one of the better investments.
Just an observation on the subject of schools. The comments about the public/private nature of the school being irrelevant are pretty much on the ball in my experience, especially by the time you start looking at graduate student or professional performance. The main thing is to look for a school that offers core courses at advanced levels, and encourages students to undertake the more rigorous options. Parents can do a lot more in this area, too. Veggie maths and physics are not what you want in 2014.
Last edited by tecman; 24th Feb 2014 at 23:25.
