Phony degree.

Holocene said:
I can understand you feeling that way.

However people can work hard and make long term sacrifices for all sorts of endeavors in life whether it's their career, business, or education; all without getting a college degree for it. I know I've worked hard in my career outside of aviation, and I know I worked hard for my pilot ratings as well as certificates outside of aviation. I have always worked hard and tried to learn as much as possible, but because I chose not to go into debt for a degree, all of that is discounted and rendered meaningless. It's just a sick game where true integrity never really enters the equation.
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Your hard work isn't meaningless, but it isn't enough to meet the qualifications; Qualifications that others have worked very hard to meet. You can't run 1/2 of a marathon and claim that you should get a completion medal because the first 1/2 was really tough. You aren't getting sympathy here because we've all put in the time, the effort, etc., and we think that reaching the goal with integrity is important. As a pilot, you place your life in the hands of the guy sitting next to you. Their integrity is important. My wife and kid may be on your plane someday. You'd better have integrity, and deserve to sit in that seat.

So no, we respect your effort that you've put into becoming a pilot. It's hard work! But for most major airlines it's just not sufficient.

Don't sacrifice your integrity for getting a stupid job. You have to live with your choices for the rest of your life. Either get the degree the right way, or get a job that doesn't require one.

Many of these diploma mills claim to give credit for relevant life experience. We might all laugh at that, but really, that's the way it should be since the only argument I've ever heard for needing an irrelevant degree is to somehow provide measure of your ability to learn and be responsible.
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Yeah so this horse has been beaten, buried, exhumed, beaten, and reburied. Get the degree, and move on. Think it won't make you better rounded? Fine. You still need it to remove your application from the "better luck next time" pile. That should be more than enough motivation, regardless of your opinion of the merits of the degree itself.

The degree is NOT irrelevant, and you know this. If it were, you wouldn't be looking for a fake one.
 
Derg said:
STABBY MCGEE! :)
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Oh Dank that's your solution for everything.

There's a guy who thinks he should exist above societal bonds and is cool with exploiting people via the trappings of civilized interaction? … STAB 'EM!

Someone strays too far from the gate agent's counter to get listed? … STAB 'EM!

Free tacos? … STAB 'EM!

(OP, I don't think you're a bad person and I sure as hell wouldn't stab you for asking about the possibility of getting away with faking a degree to get a job; that's hyperbole on my part. But maybe consider getting a cold beer in a dark bar and think over how the question got a pretty uniform response as a bad idea.)
 
Holocene said:
More than likely it's going to become evident you don't have an ATP the moment you step in the simulator. What isn't going to be evident in any simulator or cockpit is your lack of degree in liberal arts.

Funny all the negativity in this thread. There are pilots flying right now that have likely gotten hired on the basis of exaggerated numbers in their logbooks and yet nobody cares because the hours are based on an honor system.

In other words, experience directly related to the job (flying planes) is taken on the honor system, but don't you dare lie about having a liberal arts degree!

How is that not completely backwards?
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The good moral character requirement for this job prohibits lying, period.

Integrity is a function of what you do when nobody is looking.
 
re: the degree requirement. I fly with guys who have masters' degrees (be it an MBA, or a 'real' masters' - no offense to the MBA crowd), I know several PhDs at the airlines and not a few guys who have JDs and either are or soon will be admitted to the Bar. I myself have a pair of concurrently-earned Bachelor-level degrees and I wouldn't mind adding a MS or JD despite (or perhaps inspired by) @jtrain609 's best efforts. Education matters. Get as much of it as you can afford and give it your 100% effort.

The purpose of the degree requirement has little to nothing to do with your ability to slam the airplane through its paces (I mean, my education was in computing, politics and mathematics). I've had it explained several different ways but it comes down to about two things, in my view.

First, despite the fact that this job is quite standardized and regulated, we do not want people who cannot use their heads in the front office. This is a thinking person's job. Education is as much about thinking and equipping you to be a useful citizen in multiple dimensions as it is socioeconomic mobility, blah blah (other social science explanations here). You have a brain; use it and develop it to its fullest potential.

Second, having a degree shows that you can stick to something and finish it. This is really self-explanatory, but the piece of paper means you can stick to it and get things done in the long-haul.

So, go get one.
 
1st off, I am absolutely of the opinion that a degree in art history (or any other non STEM major) does not make one a better airplane pilot. If no one cares what your degree is in, then they don't care that you have one. Technical degrees do indicate that an applicant will likely fare better in training, but even that is a gross over-generalization.

2nd, I absolutely reject the assumption that adults with college degrees are automatically better educated. In fact, several studies show that 45% of college students have not shown any academic progress after 2 years, and 35% still hadn't after 4 years. I have met far too many narrow-minded idiots with college degrees to buy that myth.

Having said that, guess where I am today? Back in school trying to pass a business statistics class so that I can get that worthless piece of paper. I am doing what it takes to get to the mainline or nice corporate jobs. I could have majored in an easier course of study, but I wanted to actually learn something useful. I have a 3.5 GPA, not because any prospective employer will care, but because I demand excellence of myself.

You may be able to buy a diploma for 130 bucks, but the price of my integrity is a lot more than that. Buying a diploma from a school that you never attended is no different from forging your logbooks. If I ever found out that someone was doing something of the kind, I would do my best to make sure they never worked in this industry again.
 
USMCmech said:
1st off, I am absolutely of the opinion that a degree in art history (or any other non STEM major) does not make one a better airplane pilot. If no one cares what your degree is in, then they don't care that you have one. Technical degrees do indicate that an applicant will likely fare better in training, but even that is a gross over-generalization.

2nd, I absolutely reject the assumption that adults with college degrees are automatically better educated. In fact, several studies show that 45% of college students have not shown any academic progress after 2 years, and 35% still hadn't after 4 years. I have met far too many narrow-minded idiots with college degrees to buy that myth.
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I'd like to see these studies you mention, and I'd like to know how and what they purport to measure. One of the huge problems with the "business" reforms to education is that there's an assumption that everything in education can be quantized, and measured - scientific management, if you will, applied to the education space. This assumption is somewhere between "bad" and "horse-poop" when it comes to assessing educational outcomes, which don't necessarily have anything to do with knowledge in the sense of "student can multiply."

Incidentally, if you're putting time into it, it's clearly not worthless. ;)
 
cencal83406 said:
You are savior of the downtrodden... He who has to pencil-whip time while rolling a 172, going home to smoke pot and find a fake degree. :D
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Nice try.

I've never pencil-whipped time and it wasn't a 172.

Also you can plan on pot being legal coast to coast before the decade is out. Hopefully anyway.
 
I just finished my last class for my second degree. This thread offends me. I earned my piece of paper even it just sits there on the book shelf collecting dust. I could not look a phony piece of paper and go "yup that was worth it."
 
Autothrust Blue said:
As a transportation worker, it'll never, ever, ever (like, ever) be legal for you.
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And yet you can get smashed and fly 8hrs later.

Sorry, that's why it's so hard for me to respect asinine laws and policies; they make no sense.

I guess I'm not professional enough for the airlines, hopefully I can get a job piloting drones.
 
Holocene said:
And yet you can get smashed and fly 8hrs later.

Sorry, that's why it's so hard for me to respect asinine laws and policies; they make no sense.

I guess I'm not professional enough for the airlines, hopefully I can get a job piloting drones.
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Well that's quite the point, you can't get smashed and fly 8 hours later, and on top of that I can't think of one person here who would want to.
Have you ever thought of a career in fast food?
 
Autothrust Blue said:
I'd like to see these studies you mention,
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I did a research paper on why many marginal students should forego college and pursue a path of skilled labor. This study was part of my sources "Arum, Richard, and Josipa Roksa. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses. Chicago: University of Chicago, 2011. Print"


Incidentally, if you're putting time into it, it's clearly not worthless. ;)
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Oh, I don't disagree. But when I graduate next spring, I'll still be the same person I was when I started. I have learned some useful information, but nothing I couldn't have picked up for a lot less money.
 
Holocene said:
And yet you can get smashed and fly 8hrs later.

Sorry, that's why it's so hard for me to respect asinine laws and policies; they make no sense.

I guess I'm not professional enough for the airlines, hopefully I can get a job piloting drones.
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Attitude.
 
USMCmech said:
I did a research paper on why many marginal students should forego college and pursue a path of skilled labor. This study was part of my sources "Arum, Richard, and Josipa Roksa. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses. Chicago: University of Chicago, 2011. Print"
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Thanks for the cite, I'll have to either turn my CSU Library account back on or ask an informant.

I spent a good deal of the later part of my higher ed career (as a student) lobbying the legislature to make the California State University a funding priority and later worked for the University (although in a non-political or at least non-public-politics capacity), so it's an issue near and dear to my heart. There's definitely a problem in the CSU (when the Chancellor's Office looks at you and says "we need to increase 6-year graduation rates" you do have to go "huh" and wonder just what the problem is) and I'm sure it's going to be roughly the same problem in most other public university systems.
Oh, I don't disagree. But when I graduate next spring, I'll still be the same person I was when I started. I have learned some useful information, but nothing I couldn't have picked up for a lot less money.
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Roger that. Paragraph two is that not all higher ed "experiences" are created equal. I had a blast, learned a LOT (that I still use today) and got a boatload of opportunities that I don't necessarily think I could have gotten any other way. But I was at a relatively new institution that had set out to make a name for itself, too.
 
Here is the ROI analysis I did for that paper. Take note of the very optimistic career progression after I graduate. I'll be at least 45 before I am better off financially than I was flying boxes in a 208.

upload_2014-2-2_11-38-40.png
 
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