drpixie

Loved your post.

Have you tried working the answers to 6 decimal places for each and every calculation with rounding on your calculator turned OFF to get the to fall easily into the right box?

My failing memory suggests that was a routine required? by the regulator in the past. :{

If you can survive that process then you might have the qualities required to be a good captain one day.

With at least one of their answers to the long question being clearly incorrect.
Noel, God bless him had to work it through for them on a whiteboard, to be told, and this is just hearsay you know, we are now going to have to arrest you for having unauthourised knowledge of the question. Penalty 1,000,000 points or 20 years working for the regulator.:ok: :rolleyes:
Question to them, what about those who have accidently passed and those who have apprently failed but actually passed, corrective action will be taken? Err no. :ouch:

The Green Goblin
Seems to have it nailed and his comments regarding many iterations over shorter legs makes a lot of sense, (see my 6 decimal above would have a similar effect?) if you have the time and numeracy acuity.

In real life good operators, come back to quick and relatively dirty macro/rule of thumb answers to check the computerised calcs as they go.
The stats are full of flights that went bad because the crew were blindly following the bouncing ball instead of maintaining full SA as a double check in their heads.

It might appear to be an intelectual exercise but has actual the effect of filtering out those unsuitable even though some but not many get through the airlines net. The real lessons start when you get on the type they have assigned you and even then you may wash out for any number of reasons unrelated to flight planning

Doesn't sound like a lot has changed at the regulator and you may be right about the current situation, we have been there before.

Having said that don't give up, let things settle down, talk to your tutor, he'll have an idea of whats happening and good luck with the next one, as they say, it's the best view in the world.

What to do now?
 

I know I might be stating the obvious but I think it needs to be spelt out for some people:hmm:. Try emailing and calling the following:

-CLARC

-CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner - Online complaint form.

- AFAP (if you are a member)

Farmer Dan.

I am going to have to strongly disagree with the original poster here.

Nathan's notes and his course are fantastic, I self studied all 7 of the ATPLs and passed all first time except flight planning.
I failed the first time by 1 mark, then passed the second albeit only just.

The questions and course material havent changed, and no one should have any doubt that the material you are learning is incorrect. As for all this 727 discussion well that's another topic...

For anyone reading this post my tips to passing this exam are simple;
1. Be prepared for exteremly difficult 1 and 2 markers where you will have to do the equivalent of 3-4 marks work. CASA will make you work extremely hard for 2 marks by for e.g. giving you a weight in the middle of a climb sector and then asking you to find GW once cruising, so you'll be using intermedaite climb calculations etc. all for just 2 marks)

2. DO NOT use any super sectors. The exam has been re-jigged and the answers are extremely tightly spaced. There is no margin to average any weather whatsoever unless we are talking 1 degree of temperature (with answers 50 kg apart even 30-40 kg over a 5 hour flight you are going to have to do it the hard way) (this was my undoing on my first attempt)

3. Read the syallabus as to exaclty how CASA round their numbers. Having studied an engineering degree actually put me in worse sted for the exam, if you do not round your numbers to the nearest 3 degrees or 5 degrees for example you are going to get the question wrong. Additionally for sector ETIs use at least 2 decimal places 30 seconds of fuel at 4500 kg/hr is 38 kg!!

4. Write the distances on ERC high charts for all the common routes and highlight the common routes.

5. Work extremely fast, a basic plan should take you 10-12 minutes tops
You have 50 marks and 180 minutes. That's 3 minutes 36 seconds per mark. Do the math.

Good luck to all sitting the exam.

AA out.

I wish the guy who's wallet is now 170 dollars lighter due to a resit could tell you, but I can't, so I am not going to.

Apparently, due to the unexplainably high pass rate and "technical difficulties" it would seem this is the only way to make the exam more difficult.

Well, that's just not fair and ridiculous - particularly if this is a "change" from previous exams. You can't bring the goal posts closer together without industry involvement (eg training organisations). No matter what they say, if the current pass mark is as low as it appears, the exam is broke.

Surely the point of the exam is to assess the ability of an individual to demonstrate the application of the theory. The ridiculous rounding rules and abnormal fuel penalties (e.g. gear down climb) that are employed by CASA in this exam, guarantee that the answer (no matter how "accurate") is not realistic anyway. MANY people (not just AFT students) have been taught a particular method and "re-jigging" the exam is just not fair.

I'm disappointed that this has evidently come about as a result of cheating - so often the minority ruin it for the majority.

I believe writing to CLARC will not achieve a satisfactory outcome - it will just be forwarded to the person responsible, who, I am led to believe, strenuously denies anything is wrong/broken with the exam.

Farmer Dan's suggestion re the "CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner - Online complaint form" - is a good one - I'm finding myself agreeing with Farmer Dan every day! Please, for maximum effect, could those affected pursue this further!

I am extremely reticent to book my next exam until something has happened, though I'm not holding my breath...

Noel, God bless him had to work it through for them on a whiteboard

I presume you refer to Noel L, Gaunty ? Back in the olden days, Noel and I spent a couple of sessions in with CASA's alter ego of the day (probably still was DCA, then) and we (and several other Industry folks) were tasked with going through the exam bank to comment. Nothing wrong with questions at that stage, I suggest.

The main problem with exams has always been twofold .. on the one hand, the examiner needs to test a reasonable fraction of the syllabus and that is a hard ask with a time limited single examination. In addition, there needs to be a reasonable looksee at the student's ability to do sensible quasi-real world calculations.

My view has always been that a combination of multi-guess to look at the former combined with longhand calcs for the latter is a reasonable scenario. With the multi-guess one can put in distractors and close alternatives to sort the wheat from the chaff and provide a level of grading. The longhand exercises, though, need to concentrate on technique and logic rather than the actual answer .. providing that the student recognises if he/she has gone off on an inappropriate tangent and so identifies in the manuscript.

For exam results suddenly to skew dramatically raises concerns in several areas -

(a) it is a reasonable presumption that student ability and performance, on average, will be predictable.

(b) a significant exam result skewing suggests one of

(i) (a) didn't operate on the occasion for some reason
(ii) the particular exam(s) involved a significant step change in technical difficulty, whether up or down
(iii) the particular exam(s) involved a significant step change in the level of dissimulation, whether up or down

Do the exams need to be "practical". I suggest not, although they do need to be sensible. Requiring discrimination of answers to quite inappropriate accuracies probably is not quite necessary. As in all areas of mensuration, accuracy ought to be pitched at the reasonable requirements of what is being assessed.

Gaunty also makes the point that a commercial piloting career ought not to be the result of good attendance.

Some folks ..

(a) are particularly suited and sail through exams, endorsements and training programs without any undue difficult .. and then fly with a level of skill which makes the rest of us green with envy

(b) are reasonably suited and talented and, with a bit of work and effort, make the grade

(c) are a little behind the eight-ball to start with and, by virtue of extreme application and diligence, make the grade. I can recall (with great fondness) a couple of such folk whom I trained through their theory work and they persevered and made a good grade. One ended up a well regarded C&T chap for a respected carrier

(d) some, unfortunately, really need to look elsewhere for work

The exams, endorsement programs, line training, upgrade training programs and so forth are all part of the process which facilitates putting folks into one of the paddocks.

Does the system always get it right ? Of course not but, then, no system gets to be perfect.

The student needs to know the work and, also, have a familiarity with the style of questions and answers which the examiner is looking for.

Well do I recall my first looksee at ATPL/SCPL Flight Planning. I read the syllabus .. pretty straightforward ... swotted Worthington (a recommended standard text for the subject) ... pretty interesting and straightforward .. and then sat the exam .. pretty shattering.

Next time around I had had a look at some typical exam questions and solutions and the result was a tad different ...

A bit of a thick skin helps one to get through this aviation minefield, I suggest.

I have flown all over the world in a 135000LB grey beast, on the bones of my arse in fuel with little friendly divert options, without sitting an ATPL flight planning subject and not once run out of fuel. Only using the techniques from the good old Lockheed based flight manual and basic SGR's. Why does the exam have to be so hard and if dudes are still screwing up their planning in big aircraft, what went wrong with their type conversions?... On the subject of gross error checking the computer for fuel planning (I do it my self), how many times has it been wrong?

Your 135,000lb grey beast is operated in a completely different environment to the environment we operate in. Not saying someone who has done well in your environment wouldn't do well in ours, or vice versa. But the training to get to the same end stage is very different, the supervision along the way is very different and the outcome from failing a flight is very different.

No doubt along the path to flying a 135,000lb grey beast you've gone some extremely stressful points in your life to prove you deserve to be there. In our environment this is one of them.

Because of the inconsistency in our training, the regulator occasionally steps in. With pay for your own endorsements, training budgets have been slashed, there often isn't time to repeat a flight. With pressure from management to get a certain number of pilots on line, some candidates are passed when they possibly shouldn't be.

At this point the regulator has two options... they could put their foot down with the airline(s) and say their type conversion was inadequate. But this is a big political game and one they don't want to get involved in. Or they could simply make the standard to get to the interview stage just that little bit harder and tweak an exam that they do have control over. The only people who are going to complain aren't in a situation to do a lot about it. Guess what they decided to do?

This happens every few years, they watch the outcome and silently tweak in the direction required. Some times things get harder, sometimes an extra half hour is allowed in the exam, some times a few questions disappear.



Would this be better done at the airline level with a company that has the resources to retrain as required if someone doesn't meet the standard and the material can be made relevant to the type in question? Absolutely. But the industry is moving as far away from that as possible in an attempt to cut costs, and hence the ATPL is being used and expected to check knowledge to the level required for the first type rating, albeit on a semi-imaginary aircraft (B727 Flight Planning, combination of 767 and 737 systems, etc.). If someone isn't meeting the grade, they simply have to pay to retrain until they do. Then when they come to do the second type rating (the first real one!) there can be an assumed level of knowledge and the airlines can pay the bare minimum in training costs.

I somewhat agree and somewhat disagree. Having experienced the civilian world as a CPL holder before I joined, I have small insight into that world.

It is a very unfortunate that the organisations in the best positions to provide the training aren't due to money. So the industry has to rely on a 6% pass rate in an exam to weed out its lower performers. That does not exactly stop people from overseas with qualifications attained in a system with a much higher pass rate, being targeted by these organisations ( or talked about being targeted). Are you getting a better product there or not?

My argument is that they should be teaching relevance. Instead of wasting people's time and money on exams that require you to use calculations to six decimal places, on an aircraft built on slide rules, with charts designed before calculators. That should be invested in teaching the relevant skills to today's modern machinery. Im not saying don't teach or examine this stuff, just maybe it can be refocused.

As for growing pilots, the guts of the training on fuel planning I had before my first conversion was that the SGR of the PC9 was around 2lb/nm. The conversion was taught as type specific straight from the flight manual. Very easy to learn, you can do it without a calculator... As for the environment. We still share the same airways, fly the same SIDS, and burn Jet A1.

It's a good topic, change is not always bad, running out of fuel is. ;)

Something to answer for AFT??
 

Kalavo
You make some great points regarding military v The civil world. Thanks for the insight.

In regards to the exam. Being accurate to 5 or 10 kg is ridiculous. Delays in taxi, changes in temp / wind, final load sheet from forecast/planned will blow that out. After all you are in the planning stage and being within 100-200 kg should be more than sufficient for an aircraft the size of a 727.

I feel for the chaps who have taken leave from work, paid for accommodation, paid transport to/from AFT and paid for the course.... only to fail the ATPL exams, with AFT as primary study reference i.e. NH.

I had a chat to Gavin Secombe today, CASA flight crew licensing. The conversation went similar to this, "we are well aware of the concerns with the ATPL Flight planning exam. Further, we are more concerned of the reason why so many candidates are failing. As I speak, I am marking random candidates workings for the CASA ATPL Flight planning exam, and am trying to establish a root cause".

I asked plainly, if you had copies of the working material from candidates whom sat the exam, he replied YES!

Watch this space.

Well that sounds (somewhat) promising.

Meantime I've booked again...hopefully its fixed by then. I'll give them a week (and a few sitting dates) to see if they can work something out.

"we are well aware of the concerns with the ATPL Flight planning exam. Further, we are more concerned of the reason why so many candidates are failing. As I speak, I am marking random candidates workings for the CASA ATPL Flight planning exam, and am trying to establish a root cause"

Ummm, so there are two factors here. The candidates and the exam. As far as I can see the candidates haven't magically changed, nor has the way it is being taught (not just N.H.). G.S. claims nothing has changed with the exam, so why is there a 93% failure rate? Maybe its time for G.S. to look in the mirror for the real issue.

If there has been such a major change to the exam (which there obviously has been), then CASA needs to release new guidelines regarding the exam and content. This should have been done BEFORE the new exam came online.

As for the argument that the exam weeds pilots out of the system, I agree it is a good thing, BUT this is not the right way to do it. Don't go changing the goal posts without telling anyone and expect people to be ok with it. CASA is toying with peoples livelihoods.

Again, I urge people to make a complaint to CASA.

Farmer Dan.

Farmer Dan

Apologies, vital information I should have included in my last post.

Gavin Secombe assures me the CASA ATPL Flight plan exam content and/ or questions have not changed.

Then what happened when the exam was taken offline for a few (three?) days about a month ago to deal with the "cheating"? I don't believe that these weren't new questions.

John t.

:ok: wiseosity at its best. :cool:

Of course he assured you nothing changed....if he did then that would mean the logical explanation for all this lies at his/casa's end.

We can't have the regulator admitting they might have made an error.

The reality is that the candidates and course material had not changed. The issue has to be at the exam end.

So Gavin how about you level with us all and tell us what you changed?


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Not getting any arguments from me. Don't agree with how they've gone about solving this problem, but it's their train set, not mine.

They did the same thing way back when I sat mine... the time allowed for some exams magically increased by half hour due to the number of people failing.

It's been interesting the further I got in to the industry. Certainly noticed a huge number of pilot's spending more time trying to work out how to cheat, rather than learning the content. With everything from where answers could be hidden, to which exam centers were less likely to check what you brought in. Very disappointing to be honest and obviously a large problem for the regulator if they've decided to shake things up in such a massive way.

Adding to my story so far (and thanks to those who offered suggestions) ...

I contacted the relevant person at CASA (GS). He had obviously had many enquiries about FPL but was polite, clear, and unwavering.

His position was:
- the exam was recently updated (we know that),
- there is no problem with the exam (NO PROBLEM!),
- they are looking into why the current pass rate is so low (but there is NO PROBLEM with the exam), wouldn't say what the pass rate is,
- he suggested I continue retaking the exam until I pass (though at 5% pass rate, it could be a long time before the dice rolls in my favour),
- he didn't consider that the answers were very specific/close, or to acknowledge the idea of some standard of accuracy.

He was very clear that if I did the question is the "correct" manner, I'd get the "correct" answer. The correct manner is partially specified by the ATPL exam guide (it does specify temp and weight rounding clearly) - but the guide doesn't specify how to interpolate winds, so I'm not sure what magic method he used to get the correct answer. My thoughts, magic method #1: always extrapolate accurately to exactly 1/2, 2/3 or the FL required. Magic method #2: use F185 for descent, F235 for climb, use nearest for cruise. Magic method #3: some combination of #1 and #2. :ugh:

I'm unsurprised but pissed that this exam completely ignores the idea of testing the ability to flight plan to some level of accuracy - instead testing just that I know and can do just exactly what the examiner does. (It's like some of my Chinese PPL/CPL students asking what is the magic power setting I use for a perfect approach (they think it's perfect:O) ... must be that magic setting that we are given when we obtain CPL and do that thing with the goat and the secret handshake. Depending on the day/student, I answer either: "1743 rpm", or "whatever power gives you a perfect profile for that approach".)

So it seems that, at the moment, CASA has effectively ceased to issue ATPLs, except to that 5% of people who got really lucky. I do hope that wasn't their intention. Can I spell "overseas licence conversion"?

I suggest everyone affected both contact CASA and submit official complaints. The more obvious this becomes, the less slowly it will be dealt with.

Good post DrPixie. I don't know whether the ATPL exam guide was around when I did mine, but it seems like it's only a partial guide. Why can't CASA produce a fully worked example in the guide so that everyone, and every course provider, is on a level playing field? This way, candidates can be assured that they're being examined on the objectives of the syllabus. As it is, it appears those who fail, fail due to some arbitrary method of extrapolating data, such as the example you provided.

When I did flight planning, I used AFT but also bought Rod Avery's notes and they both used very different methods with different 'rules of thumbs' resulting in slightly different answers.

Someone has to provide "exam like questions" - for goodness sake, surely that's the point of doing a course and studying for an exam. I have never been offered any "special" practise questions or the like. I worked bloody hard juggling a young family and a very busy full time job, used my annual leave to attend what I thought was a very well run and delivered course, with some equally committed attendees, paid what is a bloody huge fee for an exam that appears flawed, and am wondering where to even start to attempt this exam again. I'm by no means the only one - I'm sure most others are in exactly the same boat. I'm not an idiot, I've achieved high 80s and some 90s for all the other subjects, all self studied. This exam is flawed and I'm pi$$ed off.

So what about the guys that did pass?
Did they know something the others didn't? Have a better understanding of the subject or how to go about the exam?
Or where they just plain lucky?

Capt Fathom

I suspect were you to perform a strict statistical probability study on variance to the examination process and the results, at least to the long question/s, you might well find that a pass or fail is a matter of luck, just like in a casino.

The prior study involved, like counting cards in the casino, in all probability :rolleyes: only marginally increases the probability of "success" in your favour. But you gotta do what you gotta do. :8

Something to answer for AFT??
 

Someone in the USA was able to obtain (under freedom of information) the one thousand odd questions and answers that are used for the FAA ATP exam. This information was then sold as part of a training package.

A typical method for this exam is to purely study the question/answer. Perhaps we need to get something along the same lines. Obviously learning how to flight plan does not help you pass.

Please don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating that sort of approach at all. I actually enjoyed studying flight planning, and I do believe it has worthwhile, tangible relevance to understanding real world flight planning. I certainly can say I have taken something away from the course I did at AFT. And, I can say that I strongly believe I now have a good grasp of the theory and the application. But, we're kidding ourselves if a fuel plan based on interpolated winds/sectors/temps/etc needs to be within 100kg on a jet that can carry nearly 30,000kg - that's not real world relevance.

I'm sure many of those that have gone before me (and passed) may scoff at this bloke who simply needs to harden up, do the study and get on with it, but the recent stats say that something is up...

Same IT experts as Airservices recent effort perhaps?;)

Something to answer for AFT??
 

JFW
I was just outlining the only approach left if this issue isn't rectified. Certainly would be a sad state of affairs. I haven't done the course but won't be starting till I am confident the result is not down to luck.

I'd say what CASA has done is used computerised flight planning software.

Then with the answers that have been spat out, they have put the wrong answers very close to the right answers.

Sounds to me like it's time to head the the US of A and get an FAA ATP then covert.

Leave your car running while you sit the exams :ok:

Secombe always taught use of the integrated range charts that start on 3-3 of the manual.

No-one else does this because they don't have these type of charts for 1eng INOP, low altitude cruise etc - so it is impractical (so the theory went) to teach the use of two different types of chart.

i'd be willing to bet that Secombe has rejigged answers with the integrated range charts.

Has anyone who recently failed used the integrated range charts?

AB,

That is some significant effort you have gone to - I for one am very appreciative! You've put in the hard yards for all of us.

PLEASE - everyone affected or sharing our concerns, support us and sign this online petition!

Many thanks,

Joe Lighty

I know the person under question..... I met him and did one of his courses and failed miserably.... so I changed text and passed no problem. I also heard him talking crap about afp many times, so to me it looks like a sort of personal issue here.
The man is also a freak in math, so I think he expect everyone to be like him ?

sign the petition guys, only 37 of us did it.

I'll also take this petition to the Australian Federation of Air Pilots (AFAP) Union I'm a member of, they should have some weight in convincing CASA something needs to be done. I encourage other members of AFAP to do the same

I sat the exam on the 20th of November and as I hit the submit button I was feeling quite confident and when 40% showed up on the screen I was quite shocked. After reading this gives me a little relief that I didn't just waste two solid months studying most nights and on my RDOs.

Something needs to be done quickly, people are wasting a lot of their time and money re-studying and re-sitting this exam and some people are coming up to their 3 year limit

Obviously been huge effort put into the petition.

But I strongly suggest that that everyone affected puts in a formal complaint to CASA. Petitions don't hold great sway, formal complaints must at least be considered.

There's a complain form under Contacts on the web.

I am in the process of submitting a complaint via the online form on the CASA website. Based on the feedback from that I will sign the petition.

When will the petition be forwarded to the relevant parties?

My fault but I am in that boat.. Plan on doing the course early next year but will only leave me about 1.5 months before mine expire :ouch:
Don't have much confidence based on whats been said here!

Are people starting to pass or has anything changed???

I have heard there is now only 50kg between exam answers?