For Student Pilots

[RitterKreuz]

Im closer than ever to opening my own flight school  :o

at least it feels like it... i heave recently come to be allowed use of a large HUGE hangar with a storage facility, and a hand full of good sized completely unused office style rooms. all i have to do is acquire an airplane.  ;D with the right partners my plan will hopefully be formulating within the next two years!

My goal has always been one of opening my own flight school, though i work for the airlines now, and may continue to work for the airlines for some time its all about owning something all your own and following your dreams right?!

so now im trying to figure out what to do with making my own flight school as desirable to students as possible! Here are a few questions regarding some of the things i would like to do with my school when the time comes.

my questions to you would be students are as follows:

answer on a scale of one through ten on each question ten being the best one being the least

1. How excited would you be about a flight school with a recreation room complete with a fairly large TV, DVD player, old pool table and several nice couches at your disposal 24 hours a day? (1 = no thanks, 10 = thats awesome)

2. How excited would you be about a flight school with an exersize room containing a bow flex and a tread mill which would be accessible to you 24 hours a day? (1= no thanks, 10 = thats awesome)

3. Would you be willing to make a refundable $300 deposit which could be used to purchase an optional customized flight jacket such as the one seen here (http://www.bestglide.com/coopergt6150mpage.htm) complete with a velcro on name patch as a right of passage? (1=no way ill keep my money, 10 = sounds like something neat to have to symbolize my success)

4. what do you think of having a planning room for flight planning with a large central table which consists of spliced sectional charts covering a 4 state region?

thanks for your answers ahead of time!

[Splinter562]

1) 8
2) 2
3) 4
4) 7

I really like your first idea here. I've rented from a lot of places over the years and seen my share of good and bad FBOs. Some just treat it like any old business and you're just any old customer. Those I find to usually be lacking as well in quality of aircraft and instruction as well. While those that embrace the aviation spirit tend to be much better places to rent from. Building a community feeling I think is important to being successful. Perhaps having a game room would be one more excuse to hang out at the airport and the weekend and swap flying stories (and to your advantage, probably go flying).

For the second idea, some may find it useful, but I think most people interested in working out already have access to some sort of access to a gym though work or school or membership to a commercial facility.

For the third, I personally would rather make the decision if I want to buy a piece of appeal or not. Having tee shirts, polo shirts, jackets, etc. for sale would be a good way to build community feeling.

And for the fourth, I am a fan of good flight planning rooms. A table covered with sectionals would probably make a good training aid for new students to visualize cross country planning as well.

As a final thought of my own: It's seems now a days that most flight schools out there thinks that every person that comes though the door for pilot training wants to go to the airlines and wants to train in G1000 172SPs. They seem to have completely forgotten that there are actually people out there who fly for fun. I have, in all honesty, been questioned why I wanted to rent a 172RG when one of the 172SPs with dual Garmin 430s was available (the 172RG actually being significantly cheaper to rent). I think that it is important to realize that, although some people come to aviation for the money or the status, many people come for the love of it and I think a flight school should reflect that. From what you are saying, it seems like you are exactly on the right track. I wish you all the best of luck getting started!

[Mobius]

1.)  4
2.)  2
3.)  3
4.)  9

I think the flight planning room is an excellent idea.  At the FBO where I rent from (and took my lessons from), the planning room is just a meeting room that is used for airport board meetings, so it's not really tailored to flight planning or anything like that.  I had to take the oral portion of my checkride in it, while other people where coming in and out, and that was really distracting, so maybe if there was a small, private room for checkrides, or just privacy, that would be really nice.  As for the other things, I can't say I would be really interested in them.  I usually just go to the airport to fly, and everyone else there is usually really busy.  I don't really ever see myself going to the airport to watch T.V. or workout or something.  There is a small pilot's lounge at my airport now, but in the last two and a half years, I've only seen one or two people in there, and I've only gone in there myself to use the phone to call FSS (a waste of time :-P).  The jacket is a pretty cool idea, I'm sure some people would be interested in one, but personally, I've already spent way too much money on flying to spend any more on a jacket I wouldn't use that often.  But then again, I'm sure there would be a good number of people that would be interested in the jacket, so I would keep it as an option.  Overall, if all of your ideas were used, it would probably be the coolest flight school ever, and I would make the trip just to see it, but I would personally rather see the money I'm putting into the airport be spent on the aircraft and flying equipment, instead of a new stationary cycle or a blue-ray player.

I think you're thinking along the right lines though.  It's important to keep the flight school interested in training students in an environment that helps them learn all that they can learn, instead of shoving newly minted pilots out the door that only know enough to pass the checkride, instead of being able to fly safely, and I think you've got the ideas to do it right.

[RitterKreuz]

an environment that helps them learn all that they can learn, instead of shoving newly minted pilots out the door that only know enough to pass the checkride, instead of being able to fly safely, and I think you've got the ideas to do it right.

exactly what i had in mind.

One thing i hated about the flight school i originally worked for a few years ago was that the owner, and ex airline captain, was interested only in the bottom line.

for example: If i felt like someone needed more work under the hood he would ask three questions

1. how is their performance on everything else?
2. Do they already have the minimum hood hours?
3. Why not just send them for a check ride and work on that later?

My observations based on what i have seen with General Aviation...

1. At least 30-40% (being generous here) of pilots who obtain a license never fly an airplane again.

2. Out of all the pilots who continue flying, at least half of them are uncomfortable with cross country flying to the extent that they rarely venture out beyond 40 or 50 miles without a more experienced pilot or instructor with them.

3. Many private pilots pass their check ride, and continue flying only to flush a majority of the regulatory and technical knowledge as well as the basic skills down the drain because of constant, un-challenging, straight and level point A to Point B flying.

4. In almost every circumstance, any lack of confidence in ability, and any fear to venture out on long cross country flights stemmed from a lack of quality instruction usually because the flight school management's chief concern was not safety... but keeping the production line in their pilot factory rolling at high speed in order to get warm bodies in and out of the door as quickly as possible.

My goals for MY flight school based on what i have seen.

1. Develop a strong family style environment which promotes comradeship between the students and the school staff. When you walk into my flight school to see if it is the place for you i will give you the grand tour and then several current students who are on property will be made available to you for any questions you might have for them   without my involvement.

2. Pilots will be trained strenuously and repeatedly to an expert level of proficiency, in virtually every available form of air navigation available from visual/pilotage using stop watch and compass, to VOR, NDB, and GPS systems. This training will be completed by undergoing extensive ground school prep and continued practical application until the student is 100% comfortable with any navigational exercise!

3. Much like aircraft managment firms will manage your airplane, my flight school will manage your currency and proficiency by scheduling  recurrent refresher courses available to its freshly minted pilots every six months... every 4th class attended satisfies one Biennial flight review. The refresher course will consist of a defensive driving style course with lunch and a single, one hour flight briefly covering critical pilot maneuvers such as steep turns, go-arounds, stall recoveries and emergency/ abnormal procedures.

4. When the instructor says the student is ready for the check ride, he takes a simulated oral exam/check ride with the chief instructor, and is scheduled with a meeting with the flight school owner where a one on one Q and A session will take place in order for the owner to gauge the reediness of the student and gather the student's opinions of the school and instructors. Then the check ride is completed and the student is presented with his custom flight jacket, and a framed certificate of completion.

As far as equipment goes, standard Cessna 172 with round gauges... none of this glass cockpit stuff. Perhaps one day when the money is right ONE glass cockpit trainer will be available for advanced training... and then only for guys who already have a license and are wanting to transition into a glass cockpit airplane.

Im currently in a dilemma about equipping the plane(s) with GPS... because i want the students to be top notch aces at sectional chart pilotage... but i also want them to be proficient at the use of GPS.

im still working on that though

[beaky]

Sounds almost too good to be true... but if you can pull off half of what you describe, that would make for a pretty good flight school.

- I'm not sure how you could keep that desire for recurrent training going in all of your students, however... unless they have higher goals, most prospective PPs want to pay as little as possible to get that ticket and then go have fun until the BFR is due. Those people, along with joyriders and sightseers, probably keep most flight schools alive.  Except for career-oriented "academies" that make their money signing people up for long-term programs. That's my impression, anyway.

-As far as the perks (jackets and game rooms, et) go: you can't build a flight school around gimmicks, except maybe bikini wash&waxes (for charity, of course )... I wouldn't even be thinking about that stuff yet. Although next time you're at Hooters you might bring the subject up...

Think about stuff like the owner of my flight school thought of: paying me to build the walls and hang the doors in the new office with dual time. At a huge discount.
You've got to really hustle to  have a successful aviation business of any kind, nowadays. It's a brutal business, from what I hear- almost as bad as farming.

-A possible solution for the GPS thing would be to have portables- this would save on cost of installation, certification, and maintenance, and students still working on good pilotage and DR can't cheat if the GPS is not aboard.

[RitterKreuz]

good points!

one thing about recurrent i would like to point out is that participation is optional. I doubt we would ever have a full recurrent class. as long as there were at least a few guys who participated in the recurrent training i would be happy.

i got the recurrent idea when a friend of mine a few weeks ago bought a Cessna 182 and wanted to get his high performance sign off. We went out and did a few steep turns, a couple of stalls, several touch ang goes, and a hand full of engine outs over the course of a couple of days... we both agreed that despite the fact that he could level off at 6,500 feet and cruise from point A to point B without wavering off course... his maneuvers wouldnt even come close to passing a check ride. steep turns were done to plus or minus about 250 feet, his stalls seemed hurried and nervous, the first thousand feet of his engine out consisted of trying to remember what to do while trimming for glide speed.

I personally trained this guy... 18 months ago all of his maneuvers were spot on... just as good as i could demonstrate them he could do them and he passed his check ride with ease.

i explained to him that instructors and long term career oriented students dont usually have problems with the maneuvers because they work constantly within a training environment. I also told him that some of what we were practicing was very important and if done properly could save his life and his family's life some day.

i further explained that he had been living in a flight environment that 90% of the time required him to take off normally, climb to cruise altitude, cruise straight and level, descent straight ahead and land normally. and that i understand that his performance on the maneuvers was based on a year and a half of not even practicing any one single maneuver.

his comment was that "it would be great if we could go up every few months and just brush up on that stuff."

several days later another guy bought a cessna 182 and had the exact same experience and made the exact same comment.

then i thought to myself... "hmm well if perhaps a refresher course was offered to these guys in the form of like a pizza party style 2 hour ground school and one quickie flight to brush up on engine outs and stalls that might not be a bad idea"

i dont know... im kicking a lot of stuff around in my head right now, HALF of which probably will never see the light of day. what can i say?

aviation is for dreamers.  ;D