Having achieved a “gentleman’s degree” in Aero (or a Desmond, depending on your era), I have had a successful career as an airline pilot and a parallel career as a commercial flying instructor. The degree has not been especially relevant for the most part and wasn’t a requirement to apply for the job.

The ATPL certainly wasn’t easy but it wasn’t degree level in terms of academic study.

rob_ste97

Well that's a good start but you don't know what you can achieve until you try it. As a pilot you'll be tested every year of your life, in the simulator and in the air as well as written exams. It's not degree level stuff but you need to apply yourself at every stage of training and not give up when the going gets tough. Most of the people who really want to be pilots will achieve their aim, those who think it'll be 'too difficult' probably won't. Get your PPL post lockdown and move forward from there.

This makes no sense... A fATPL is WAY cheaper than a degree. You can certainly do it for £35-40k.

To get a degree you're looking at £9250 per year for 3 years = £27,750 not including living costs. If you work full time for 2 years you can take your £27,750 plus whatever you've managed to save and easily afford to spend the third year getting licenced.

rudestuff

You can’t get a student loan for an fATPL, unless your parents are willing to/able to put their house up for it.

rudestuff

It depends where. UK tuitons are amongst the HIGHEST in all of Europe (and the world other than the US for that matter). Studying a degree in many European countries is peanuts compared to the cost of flight training. I studied a 5 year MSc level engineering degree, the combined tuiton of all those years cost LESS than my PPL. It's perfectly possible that many young teenagers want to be pilots but study for a degree instead because they can't afford the flight training.

On the other hand, 35-40k for a frozen ATPL is rather optimistic. That's what I paid for the CPL/IR alone, not accounting for PPL, time building, medicals, ATPL course and exams etc. A more realistic figure is 60-70k.

Have not seen this above yet:

The trade skills of a professional pilot in the upcoming 40 years are not going to be based on engineering aptitude or formal technical education. As much as it is a bitter pill to swallow for many of us who did their little fragments of "hardware" science back in the day. For quite some time, that does not make one more appropriately qualified.

Some of that still is and will remain a core must, and as such is defined by the scope of ATPL syllabus and its pass rate limit.s If you have passed the degree, you possess the necessary intellect and mental capacity to pass the ATPLs too.

kintyred

Show off! I got an 'F' for my A level Maths and O level passes for my A level Physics and Chemistry. Hamble had said that I needed two A level passes and I was in..............fortunately the RAF had said that my 'O' levels would do provided that I could drink 6 pints a night and not fall over. Several thousand hours later I'm still glad that I was so lazy in the 6th form :-)

I have a BSc and an ATPL and can assure you that the academic content of an ATPL is nowhere near Bachelor Degree level.
Your biggest problem if you do get into aviation is that you might be bored :mad:.
The real question is ; do you love flying ?
Thats all that matters.

Ahaha there is no relationship whatsoever between one’s academic capabilities and being a pilot. In fact quite the opposite almost. You need a decent understanding of the theory yes (not even close to an engineering degree), but more importantly you need to quickly use it within a flight operation, within a specific timeframe and in coordination with a number of people from different countries. As you very well understand this has little to do with how well you can solve a logarithm.

Now if the original question was, rubbish state of the industry any alternative career..well then...

rob_ste97

You're kind of missing my point I'm afraid.

Let's at least agree that a degree takes 3 years and flight training about one year?

That gives you a 2 year headstart to get a job, preferably two and start saving. With £20k in the bank and good behaviour you could easily borrow the last £15k with no security, or split it over multiple credit cards at 0%

And yes, it is ENTIRELY possible to get an EASA fATPL for £35-40k, you just have to think outside the box

PilotLZ

I have never even put the grade obtained on my resume. I put the qualification acquired but omit the grade. Never once been asked what grade I got.

rudestuff

I think going down either the modular or integrated route for the next 5-10 years is extremely risky right now. For years to come there is going to be a glut of pilots on the market and landing that elusive first job is going to be tricky.

highflyer40

Agreed, however... It doesn't take long for a glut to turn into a shortage, and as it's almost impossible to predict when that will happen the only mitigation is to be ready for it.

Yes, there's a huge glut because we in the middle of a pandemic - but how long will that take to solve? And when it is, how long will it take for normal service to return? The pilots exist, the planes are parked up so the only thing missing is customers - and I'm sure loads of people will be gagging for a holiday. A great deal of guys in their last 5 years will simply never return to flying due to changes in t&cs, loss of seniority or status etc, plus don't forget 3-4% of pilots retire or lose their medicals every year anyway it's not too hard to envisage another shortage looming, especially if people aren't training.
You can't catch the wave if you aren't in the water - and let's be honest, if you really want to be a pilot you aren't going to let a little thing like competition or pprune stop you...

Very much agree.

Sometimes I wish I hadn't listened to anyone and just did what I wanted. I don't regret having gone to engineering school, but it's been a lot of time and effort which could have been redirected towards becoming a better pilot.

rob_ste97

I have a 2:1 BA and 2:1 BSc and ATPLs. I found the ATPL’s by far the most challenging, however I suspect this was due to me completing them in a relatively short timespan and aiming to achieve a high average and first time passes. The subject matter isn’t challenging, as everyone else says it’s the volume of information you’re required to retain which is the tricky bit.

There are some I know who have no academic qualifications beyond GCSE and did exceptionally well at ATPL, others who were on paper far more qualified and didn’t do so well.

I suspect if you even manage to scrape a pass in Aero Eng at degree level then you will likely breeze through the more complex ATPL theory. Much of it is learning by rote and is in many cases an exercise in verbal reasoning more than anything else.

Good luck in whatever you decide to do, certainly don’t write yourself off based on your performance in what I understand to be a demanding degree level course.

Flying and degrees
 

I have a first class honours degree in engineering (aeronautics major). It was my intention to join the RAF to do my National Service and learn to fly, as I had also passed all the aptitude tests etc at Uni when I applied to get into the Air Squadron. I didn't get in to the UAS, (my legs were too long for the Harvards they were flying at the time - dates me!) but I got a chit which would have had me sent straight to Cranwell when my call up came. Alas, I joined Rolls-Royce on graduation and they trained me as an aircraft engine designer and I was placed in the Conway design team. I was then told that I was now exempt from NS (the Conway was a military engine at that time) and would be serving out my time at R-R and I could forget all about the RAF.
Long story, short - One of my colleagues on the Conway at R-R was a glider pilot (an instructor in fact) and he took me gliding. I learned to fly and eventually I also became an instructor. My engineering degree came in handy when I was made Club Technical Officer and had to look after all the ground kit like winches, vehicles etc.but it was little help for flying. I enjoyed gliding so much that I never bothered to do any power flying apart from odd two seater rides in the Tiger Moth tug on weather flights. I had a long happy time teaching other folk to fly, and flying all over the country in my own glider. 2200 sorties and no prangs. Lots of interesting cross country flights with field landings mostly, and I sent lots of people solo and made lots of friends. My degree was no real help in learning to fly. My skill as a motorcyclist was much more use. If you want to fly for fun, and it is the best fun you can have with your clothes on, I wouldn't want to be a modern airline pilot. Sounds like a very boring job to me.

Oh! and I would't worry about the class of your degree. I had several different careers as an design engineer and I was never ever asked to produce my degree scroll in forty years. I finished my career as a Chief Engineer (on laser guided weapons) with GEC, and that was fun too.

I loved this comment because in some ways it is true. You will often meet undereducated, degree-less, uncultured pilots who have had a perfectly acceptable airline career. You'll also meet some of the brightest, well educated, and cultured pilots. What all, bar a very few, will have is a great attitude to life and work, a natural intelligence which presents as practical problem solvers and a resilience which is becoming hard to find. Which is why some forward thinking airlines are ditching the HR test and qualification selection for something closer to what it was years ago where the Chief Pilot or DFO would look at the entire person and decide if he fitted their criteria for being the right person to employ. Please finish your degree, but don't judge yourself by it as the airlines could be missing out on a really good candidate. this speaking as BA Hons. Fail and 16000 Airbus hours.

Primary degrees really test your exam taking skills, and not much else. It took me five years to get a really weak general degree in science, it should take three. But since then, I've got two MSc's, and a PhD. Don't read to much into how you are doing on your primary degree.
Get out there, and get flying. If you really want something, it will happen, and I firmly believe that grit and persistence is more important that out of the box smarts.

If it makes you feel any better, I got terrible GCSEs. So bad infact my school prohibited me from even applying for A-levels and kicked me out of school. Ended up going to college and did quite well. Got onto a Degree course that was way over my head, and despite resitting my final year, still only walked out with a 3rd. Somhow managed to convince to head of dept to let me do an MSc (I was paying after all). I was oddly offered a PhD even though my MSc wasn't great, but I declined as I didn't particularly enjoy number crunching in a windowless office for 15 months and couldn't bare the thought of doing it for another 3 years.....plus the rest of my life. So I decided to give flight training a chance before it was too late. There were a couple of ATPL subjects my brain just didn't understand, but with PPL knowledge and a determination to get through them, they're not difficult. I ended up teaching ATPLs for a few years after I finished which I loved, and now sit happily in the RHS of a shiny jet. The vast majority of my collegues dont have degrees, they're not needed, unless you want something to fall back on in the future. But given the current market, falling back on a practical vocation is better than any degree.

The biggest problem I see with an airline pilot pursuing a non-flying job is persuading then that you want to be there, and that you aren't just waiting for another airline job to come along...

"Which is why some forward thinking airlines are ditching the HR test and qualification selection for something closer to what it was years ago where the Chief Pilot or DFO would look at the entire person and decide if he fitted their criteria for being the right person to employ. "

LOL! I had to interview replacements when I was leaving a large company in Bristol as its Chief Pilot, and they all went through the psycho test as part of the human remains nonsense - I wouldn't have picked any one of them, subsequently proved right.

To the OP - don't worry too much about degrees - many of the most influential movers and shakers in this world don't have one, which makes them more able to think out of the box. The only time I found anything like that actually useful was in dealing directy with the type of customer whose brother was a crew chief in Vietnam and therefore knows everything - in those type of countries (Canada, USA on the oil patch) a PhD really kicks butt. Otherwise, they are arguably useful for management positions, but reread the first sentence! Most HR departments put something like that in as a means of weeding people out.

This thread has moved away from the OP's request I think. However I agree that if your particular career does not actually need a degree then don't get one. However since I joined the rat race (in 1954) the goalposts have moved. Time was, before mine, you could actually spend your whole working life in one sort of job. My father did, and went from office boy to Chief Accountant on the railway. I have had seven different jobs in engineering from aircraft engines to laser guidance via heavy engineering, machine tools, photocopiers, and tank sights. What you should get from a degree is the capability to pick up new things quickly and know how to find out what you need to know. The parting words of the Dean of Engineering on day one at my university were "Gentlemen (we were all men) if there is one thing I want you to learn here on your way to a degree, it is how to learn quickly and how to use a library." Nowadays the last bit would be how to use Google I suppose.
It also puts your feet on the ladder a few rungs up at the beginning of your working life. The way airline flying is going right now I would be for studying something else (a science subject for choice) and join the UAS if they have one or a gliding club.Quite a few of the people I taught to fly on gliders went on to being airline pilots.

I have to agree with the poster who could see little value in a PhD. For other than academics this is true. I have met more thick PhD's than any other class of graduates.

Rob

I don't have a degree, I did go to Uni to do a degree but got told not to bother going back after the end of the first year, and the degree was Mickey Mouse in comparison to the one you are doing I didn't even do A levels, they would have been way too hard, I got into uni on the back of a BTEC course. I also only managed 5 'O' Levels at school. Like you, I mistakenly thought that there was no way I could be a pilot, till somebody told me that you really don't need to be all that bright, and that was it, I gave up my job within 3 months of that info and went to get my CPL/ATPL. Did I find it hard, yes, very, especially the mathematical subjects which are usually the ones that people take as bankers to pass, yes, I failed loading and Perf E, but with determination I got there, and I firmly believe anyone can do providing they want it enough.

Just because your degree isn't going well doesn't matter one jot.

My god is this thread back again.

I've two degrees in aerospace engineering (BEng and PhD) and I've EU, US and UK CPL/IRs and a few thousand hours. I choose to earn my living mainly in boffinry and fly occasionally, rather than the other way around for reasons that suit me (and in 2021 that certainly makes for a more secure income!). I've also taught or examined aeronautical engineering at several university, and also occasionally teach flying. Anyhow, I think that makes me qualified to answer the question .

Firstly an aero eng degree tells you virtually nothing about your aptitudes to be a pilot - anybody who told you otherwise was doing you no favours whatsoever. Never trust that person's advice again.

Secondly however, it's a highly regarded and tough degree. Well done for getting this far, do your best - there is absolutely no point in quitting in your final year, after paying the fees and when nobody is hiring pilots. Do your damndest, and shoot at least for a 2:2 which will make you much more employable than a 3rd, but equally a 3rd is not something to be ashamed of. You can still become an Incorporated Engineer with that, and if you add a 1-year MSc you can become Chartered.

A degree is much more difficult in terms of analysis and understanding. A CPL or ATPL (not much difference in the theory really) is much more difficult in terms of memorisation and recall. So again whoever told you they are equivalent was also doing you no favours - it's nonsense. You may sail through ATPLs after this, or you may find you simply haven't the aptitude for them, your degree experience will help a bit, but not much, and tell you little about how well you'll do.

A great many jobs in aerospace engineering do not require the sort of heavy number crunching and analysis that you are having to pass exams in. The majority of people teaching you at university have never done any of those jobs, they are really employed as researchers who do a bit of teaching, so simply don't have a grasp of that. So...

- You may, or may not, be perfectly suited to a job in aerospace or aeronautical engineering
- You may, or may not, be perfectly suited to training as a professional pilot.

The way to find out whether you have any aptitude for flying as a profession is indeed to do a PPL. Make sure your school know that you're considering a professional flying career, and ensure they hold you to those standards in your training. By the time you have your PPL you'll know whether you have the aptitude and dedication to take that path - nothing you've done so far will tell you that, apart from the very impressive achievement of making it to the final year of a difficult degree course which you are finding very tough. That, actually, is something to be extremely proud of, and sensible future employers will absolutely get that too. There are many jobs that you can do with that degree, some in aeronautical engineering, some outside that nonetheless prize the skills you have developed in getting this far.

In summary
- Yes you can be a pilot. Probably.
- No don't give up on your degree. This far in, finish it, and do your best to get a 2:2.
- You've done pretty well so far, don't let anybody tell you otherwise.
- Aviation, and engineering, are big industries - there are a lot of jobs you can potentially do, many very exciting, from where you are now. Most of those aren't analysis jobs.

Jobs you could do. Pilot. Engineering management. Engineering and aviation sales. Business development. Quality. Planning. RAF/RN/Army Officer or NCO in any branch, not just GD or engineering. That's a tiny subset of the full list, and none of them are excluded to you. There are a lot more jobs in aviation than engineer and pilot.

Genghis is right. He and I both agree that a degree is not essential to being a pilot, but it is essential these days to get a job in a technical sphere. Finish your degree and start earning money. Fly for fun if you can. If the urge to try to get those jolly gold bands on your cuffs persists, then you can still do that, and if the business falls apart as it has done this last year, you can still make a decent living. If you do it that way round you won't join the moaners on here wishing they had.

What you advice is what I have done. Go to uni, study an engineering degree, get a job, earn money, fly for fun and then slowly get the liceces via the modular route.

However, this has its own drawbacks. At some point in life you must make a decision and choose what you want to do. If you're constantly trying to leave too many options open, this may lead to a lack of commitment. In my case, had I not been working full time I could have finished my training sooner, before Covid, and now wouldn't be stuck with useless UK licences because of Brexit. Sure, my case is rather anecdotal, but still comes to show that not committing yourself 100% to something may mean you won't get there.

So if someone who is 18 now, wants to be a pilot, asks me whether it makes sense to study a degree first. Honestly, I don't really know what I would say.

A major point here is that having a career backup is a good thing, but in many cases a degree is not that. Train as a lifeguard, or a chef, or a plumber - all of which will be quicker and cheaper than getting a degree, and likely to get you a job faster when you need one.

A 4 year engineering degree, at £9k.pa tuition, plus living expenses is one hell of an investment in yourself. There is, in my view, only one reason to do it - a passion for engineering and likely interest in taking that career path.

Also do a degree, any degree, then switch to pilot training - and you will find yourself 2 years later with your degree skills rusty and potentially in competition against people who have just graduated and are a lot sharper than you are now. As a backup plan, it is an absolutely lousy one. Also bear in mind that an MEng graduate is applying for trainee positions - it's another 4 years to get your CEng.

There is a bit of an exception - if you are dead-set on an aviation career, but are more relaxed about *what* aviation career, then the combo of an aero-eng degree and licences, may open a lot of doors to you. But let's not pretend that's a cheap or easy option - 4 years to get the degree plus 2 years to get a CPL, leaves you probably £130k in debt and still at the bottom of either career ladder.

I would say pick one and take it seriously - then consider doing the other in your spare time whilst working, either an engineering degree with the OU whilst flying or job hunting, or modular and PAYG whilst working as an engineer. But studying an aero-eng degree, to then go straight into pilot training - that strikes me as very poor planning indeed in the modern world.

Here I must agree again with Genghis. I differ about the 'rusty' comment though . A degree teaches you [b]how to learn - any degree will do. Learning a 'trade' as a back up should professional flying turn sour for any reason (health, passing tests, downturn, etc) is not as good as having the degree, even if it might be a quicker way into a job, when the ordure hits the ventilator. Having demonstrated your capability to learn fast by having a degree, will always be a better route to safety. In any case any degree is swiftly outdated, but the key thing that is not, is the learning skill. I reckon my first class degree in engineering was out of date in less than ten years from graduation, but by then I was well on my way up the management ladder.

Having a 'trade' as well as a degree worked wonderfully for me when I was made redundant by the collapse of the company I was in. Having been trained in my youth as a draughtsman I was back in the building I had just left the following week, as a contract draughtsman to get some jobs finished to help the administration team complete a contract and get some cash in for the creditors. I had been a Chief Designer in the outfit which went bust. Six weeks later I re-mustered in my proper rank in another firm. The taxman said it would not be worth his while to collect income tax for the six weeks as well!

New start
 

hii!
I am a student of bachelors in Mechanical Engineering and have been given a scholarship to earn a Professional pilot degree in University of Debrecen Hungary. anyone who can guide me that what is the job status and the value of the degree from this university in this course. anyone who is a graduate of University of Debrecen who can give me any advice on what should I do?
I shall be very thankful to you in advance.

A rule of thumb, you don't need a degree to become a pilot in Europe, unless you want to go into higher management. Anyone paying for a degree but wanting to fly - I'd recommend just spending that money on flight training, but if it's free then you might as well go for it.

well rudestuff the problem is I don't know anything about it and I need someone to guide me through what is the best choice I don't want to go blindly.

I would have to agree with Rudestuff; however, a degree is always something to fall back on if you fall into any health problems and lose your medical - I really hope you are never in that situation, but I have seen it happen many times to colleagues.

Best of luck with your journey! You wont regret it :)

Do both, you will not regret having a degree. However, there may be a time in your life you regret not doing one.