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Originally Posted by JPhillips
What careers are available with that degree? Will he get flight training as a part of the course work?
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They have a couple of paths, one is a professional pilot (which he will pursue), and they have paths for Air Traffic Controller, and Airport/Business Management. The flight program costs are all additional to the regular tuition. So he will get his ratings, the program gets them through commercial multi, but he will also get all his CFI ratings there so he can teach.
The regional airlines are hurting for guys right now. Right now, they are recruiting guys, and putting them into pre-hire pools contingent on them getting their flight time and completing the programs. It's quite a bit different now than when I did training for that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Surtt
I went to University of North Dakota, also one of the few schools with an aviation program.
Basically, Flight training is the program.
It allows students to get multi-engine certification and enough hours to get hired by commuter airlines.
Helicopter certification is also a big program.
The armed services are/were heavily recruiting the students.
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Flight times are a bit more stringent now. The FAA requires 1500 hours to be able to work as an airline pilot in the US now. He will finish his commercial with about 200 hours. That's a pretty big gap, hence the need to get his CFI and teach. He can do about 800 flight hours in a year if he's flying 5 days a week. Also, the school is certified by the FAA, meaning he can get a 500 hour credit and get a restricted ATP rating at 1000 hours and start working then. So about a hard year of teaching before he could get picked up. Which all things considered, isn't too shabby.
My company is planning to announce a new hiring program this week and they've told us that it's going to open up more avenues and opportunities to get good applicants. We'll see, but between being a legacy (my kid) and as long as he does well through training and his job, he could feasibly be at my company in about 8 years, at the age of 26ish, with just about 40 years to go.
He's probably the last of the career though. Companies are going to pushe for single pilot and eventually no pilot operations. Forty years from now things are going to look a lot different in aviation. Still, if he can pull that off, it's still a 7-10 Million dollar career (assuming the industry doesn't collapse, BIG if).