Yea I took one before I entered college. Its a placement test to see if you can skip College Algebra and English 1010. I just don't understand why a flying company would make you take that test?
Computerized Pilot Aptitude Screening System
COMPASS consists of six tests which have been developed to test some of the key aptitude areas for the pilot profession. Flying experience is not required to perform well in the tests.
The tests include:
Control A compensation task looking at basic hand / foot / eye co-ordination.
Slalom A tracking task looking at hand / eye co-ordination.
Mathematics A test of basic applied mathematical understanding and speed.
Memory Accuracy of short-term memory recall and ability to 'chunk’ information.
Task Manager A test of the candidate’s ability to scan the screen and manage two concurrent tasks accurately and quickly.
Orientation Instrument interpretation, comprehension and spatial orientation.
Tech-Test Technical comprehension test (physics test)
Aviation-English Test English language ability, including recognizing ATC sound messages
Verbal Reasoning The ability of the candidate to understand, analyze and logically interpret written information
Design:
COMPASS is a product of European Pilot Selection & Training (EPST). The test battery was designed and developed by Captain Robin Acton BA (design and testing), Dr John Acton PhD (data processing) and Ing. Martijn Niekerk BSc (IT specialist). Robin Acton has been involved in basic pilot training since 1968 and was British Airway’s manager responsible for pilot recruitment and selection in the late 1980s.
Validation:
An independent validation of the COMPASS product has recently been carried out by Mr. Wouter Tooren of the University of Amsterdam as the final practice part for his study psychologist. The total validity of the COMPASS test is .761. The confidence level is also .79. This means that if someone takes the tests twice, the odds are .79 that the result will be the same. Also here the lowest level is .6. A lot of tests give a confidence level that can be calculated in many ways. Often tests are divided in two parts and one half linked to the other half. The EPST method (analysing results of candidates doing the test with 3 months in between) is more realistic but often gives a lower result. So .79 is not bad.” The confidence level was analyzed several years ago by Drs. Lilian Biber-Klever of the Aviation Human Factor Center. Drs. Lillian Biber is a specialist Aviation Psychologist.
It is EPST's experience (together with its world-wide clients with over 17.000 tests performed with this product) that a combination of COMPASS and a simulator assessment prior to training virtually reduces flying training failures to near zero. We at EPST had no flying training failure since the introduction of these elements in our selection.
COMPASS is available in the following languages (instruction text):
British and American English, Chinese (2 versions), Spanish Turkey, Arabic and Russian.
