AQP?

[USMCmech]

What exactly is AQP? How is it different than "standard" 121 training? Why is it better?

I just got through 121 training in an AQP program and it was probably the most stressful, confusing, disorganized mess of a program I've ever been through. Despite having prior 121 experience I was hopelessly lost through the entire process. Somehow I muddled through but I was hanging on by my fingernails for the entire process. I'm dead serious when I say that Mesa's training program was MUCH better (at least when I went though it).

The study materials were both incomplete and inaccurate. I had to dig through the manuals to build my own profiles in a format that I could actually decipher. The indoc class left me completely lost. I needed (still do) a basic class on how to look up stuff in the company manuals. We got exactly one day of training on how to program the FMS, which was completely inadequate. Contrasting with my experiences at the very well organized FSI or CAE programs, this was very fustrating.

The hands on instruction started with "it's all in the manual, just study it yourself" and then there was no standardization across the instructors. Most of the real training seemed to be happening at the hotel as the preceding class passed down tribal knowledge to the next. There was no application of how lessons applied to operations on the line.

I'm glad to be done with my new type rating and excited to be instructing in the sims again, but I'm also very burnt out after this whole process. I'm sure that being a busy single dad studying on my own didn't help at all. I've also learned that I'm well into the "old dogs learning new tricks" age bracket and had trouble keeping up with my 21 year old sim partner.

 

[Roger Roger]

There’s no oral and the checkride gets done in stages. I guess people like those parts of it?

 

[mikecweb]

A good AQP training department is career changing.

 

[Maurus]

AQP varies by airline. Some made it just like standard 121 training (*caugh* PSA *caugh*) and others made a fully fleshed out training program intended to actually improve pilots in a low risk environment.

AQP is intended to focus more on training than checking. It also requires them to find weak areas in the pilot group and train those areas.

CQ events tend to be very different compared to initial training.

 

[Skåning]

I just got through 121 training in an AQP program and it was probably the most stressful, confusing, disorganized mess of a program I've ever been through. Despite having prior 121 experience I was hopelessly lost through the entire process. Somehow I muddled through but I was hanging on by my fingernails for the entire process. I'm dead serious when I say that Mesa's training program was MUCH better (at least when I went though it).

The study materials were both incomplete and inaccurate. I had to dig through the manuals to build my own profiles in a format that I could actually decipher. The indoc class left me completely lost. I needed (still do) a basic class on how to look up stuff in the company manuals. We got exactly one day of training on how to program the FMS, which was completely inadequate.

Sounds like my experience in training at the the eskimo airline

 

[ClearedForOption]

What exactly is AQP? How is it different than "standard" 121 training? Why is it better?

I just got through 121 training in an AQP program and it was probably the most stressful, confusing, disorganized mess of a program I've ever been through. Despite having prior 121 experience I was hopelessly lost through the entire process. Somehow I muddled through but I was hanging on by my fingernails for the entire process. I'm dead serious when I say that Mesa's training program was MUCH better (at least when I went though it).

The study materials were both incomplete and inaccurate. I had to dig through the manuals to build my own profiles in a format that I could actually decipher. The indoc class left me completely lost. I needed (still do) a basic class on how to look up stuff in the company manuals. We got exactly one day of training on how to program the FMS, which was completely inadequate. Contrasting with my experiences at the very well organized FSI or CAE programs, this was very fustrating.

The hands on instruction started with "it's all in the manual, just study it yourself" and then there was no standardization across the instructors. Most of the real training seemed to be happening at the hotel as the preceding class passed down tribal knowledge to the next. There was no application of how lessons applied to operations on the line.

I'm glad to be done with my new type rating and excited to be instructing in the sims again, but I'm also very burnt out after this whole process. I'm sure that being a busy single dad studying on my own didn't help at all. I've also learned that I'm well into the "old dogs learning new tricks" age bracket and had trouble keeping up with my 21 year old sim partner.

So are you going to be training other pilots going through initial in the same environment that you were stressed, lost, disorganized, and confused in?

 

[USMCmech]

So are you going to be training other pilots going through initial in the same environment that you were stressed, lost, disorganized, and confused in?

I’m going to do my best but I have a LOT to learn before I feel ready.

 

[ClearedForOption]

I’m going to do my best but I have a LOT to learn before I feel ready.

At least under AQP you are basically teaching modules with specific goals/standards/grading and following a script. Theoretically.

 

[DE727UPS]

Interesting comment of FSI vs AQP. My recent corporate training experience was horrible compared to brown AQP, but it wasn't FSI, either. I saw old skool training on the 727 and AQP on the 75/76. AQP was faster paced and used more individual computer training vs formal ground schools. Also, no oral, just a written test. I thought AQP was easier in some ways but also way too rushed. CQ followed the same format each year except for attention to "problems areas" that were identified the year before. I guess AQP is what your airline makes of it. Over the years, I saw even AQP dumbed down with things like fewer memory items (which I thought was good). All they gotta do is get it past the feds and they can save millions, I'm sure. End the end, brown didn't even have a formal ground school day for CQ. It was all home study and you show up for two days of sim and that's it. Saved millions.

 

[alaskadrifter]

What exactly is AQP? How is it different than "standard" 121 training? Why is it better?

I just got through 121 training in an AQP program and it was probably the most stressful, confusing, disorganized mess of a program I've ever been through. Despite having prior 121 experience I was hopelessly lost through the entire process. Somehow I muddled through but I was hanging on by my fingernails for the entire process. I'm dead serious when I say that Mesa's training program was MUCH better (at least when I went though it).

The study materials were both incomplete and inaccurate. I had to dig through the manuals to build my own profiles in a format that I could actually decipher. The indoc class left me completely lost. I needed (still do) a basic class on how to look up stuff in the company manuals. We got exactly one day of training on how to program the FMS, which was completely inadequate. Contrasting with my experiences at the very well organized FSI or CAE programs, this was very fustrating.

The hands on instruction started with "it's all in the manual, just study it yourself" and then there was no standardization across the instructors. Most of the real training seemed to be happening at the hotel as the preceding class passed down tribal knowledge to the next. There was no application of how lessons applied to operations on the line.

I'm glad to be done with my new type rating and excited to be instructing in the sims again, but I'm also very burnt out after this whole process. I'm sure that being a busy single dad studying on my own didn't help at all. I've also learned that I'm well into the "old dogs learning new tricks" age bracket and had trouble keeping up with my 21 year old sim partner.

Did I miss something? I’ve been off of Facebook for a while now.

 

[killbilly]

AQP programs vary. Think of it like 141 - they're all FAA approved, but they're not all done the same way. The program I'm in right now is vastly different from the other programs at the same carrier - and it's quite different from anything I"ve ever seen or heard of elsewhere.

 

[form810]

So are you going to be training other pilots going through initial in the same environment that you were stressed, lost, disorganized, and confused in?

Yes.

And that's precisely how we become an Idiocracy... without the idiots even noticing. (Crabs in a gradually heated pot of water and all that, eh? Cough, cough... [spelled correctly this time]).

This is kinda like the new "colleges" and "universities" who give "students" credit for "real world experience" (aka what they already "know"). Much like the airlines can't find qualified instructors, those colleges can't find qualified professors. Even if they could, real professors would be very bad for business (and by business, I mean unmerited profits).

One, what the heck is the "real" world anymore?
Two, even if your particular world is "real" and you actually know a couple things, you don't go to school to learn stuff you already know; You go to school to learn new things, to expand your perspectives, and maybe just maybe to learn skepticism so you become able to reassess your biases and assumptions.

But I'm just ChatGTP, so you know, just like the FAA who "developed" AQP, and the airlines who can no longer find qualified instructors... why bother actually thinking about the consequences of this insidious dumbing down. Just git 'er done (tick the boxes), collect yer check and go home, yeah?

 

[ppragman]

I wanted to try to build one long ago, though I've never done AQP. It's hard to set up under 135, and I think there are only a few companies that have done it? But I'm unsure.

Yes.

And that's precisely how we become an Idiocracy... without the idiots even noticing. (Crabs in a gradually heated pot of water and all that, eh? Cough, cough... [spelled correctly this time]).

This is kinda like the new "colleges" and "universities" who give "students" credit for "real world experience" (aka what they already "know"). Much like the airlines can't find qualified instructors, those colleges can't find qualified professors. Even if they could, real professors would be very bad for business (and by business, I mean unmerited profits).

One, what the heck is the "real" world anymore?
Two, even if your particular world is "real" and you actually know a couple things, you don't go to school to learn stuff you already know; You go to school to learn new things, to expand your perspectives, and maybe just maybe to learn skepticism so you become able to reassess your biases and assumptions.

But I'm just ChatGTP, so you know, just like the FAA who "developed" AQP, and the airlines who can no longer find qualified instructors... why bother actually thinking about the consequences of this insidious dumbing down. Just git 'er done (tick the boxes), collect yer check and go home, yeah?

Arguably using statistics from your FOQA program and other parts of your organization to inform what training you do - which, as I understand it - is supposed to be a major part of AQP - seems like a pretty good idea, just saying.


Thread Creep Starts here:

Also, because you asked, there really isn't much of a real-world. There wasn't one to begin with. Even the world we can describe with science has limitations in terms of how we can actually perceive it. If you want a good read that has some ideas (one which I would have read while I was flying, because, contextualized in the cockpit, the first 50% of the book is a really useful way to analyze problems), check out "The Case Against Reality."

https://www.amazon.com/The-Case-Against-Reality/dp/0141983418/ref=asc_df_0141983418/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=598295323420&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8794905676485960034&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9033836&hvtargid=pla-920250401265&psc=1&mcid=475b1039998938dfbe5eb2f1dd835312&gclid=Cj0KCQiAsburBhCIARIsAExmsu6aAv0BsnyD2QxSpU1MLZ-DXi7rKXCpGXhXKbQ-w5KXR37TZqJXgTcaAv14EALw_wcB

It's really good, and provides some tools for how to analyze complex systems. In particular, I was unaware of the "Universal Acid" idea, as a way to do systems analysis, but it definitely matches with life experience. In a flying company, and from a training department or standards department sort of standpoint I think the equivalent of "universal acid", "this policy only makes sense if we could perform it 40,000 times a year and have nobody get in an accident."

 

[Cherokee_Cruiser]

What exactly is AQP? How is it different than "standard" 121 training? Why is it better?

I just got through 121 training in an AQP program and it was probably the most stressful, confusing, disorganized mess of a program I've ever been through. Despite having prior 121 experience I was hopelessly lost through the entire process. Somehow I muddled through but I was hanging on by my fingernails for the entire process. I'm dead serious when I say that Mesa's training program was MUCH better (at least when I went though it).

The study materials were both incomplete and inaccurate. I had to dig through the manuals to build my own profiles in a format that I could actually decipher. The indoc class left me completely lost. I needed (still do) a basic class on how to look up stuff in the company manuals. We got exactly one day of training on how to program the FMS, which was completely inadequate. Contrasting with my experiences at the very well organized FSI or CAE programs, this was very fustrating.

The hands on instruction started with "it's all in the manual, just study it yourself" and then there was no standardization across the instructors. Most of the real training seemed to be happening at the hotel as the preceding class passed down tribal knowledge to the next. There was no application of how lessons applied to operations on the line.

I'm glad to be done with my new type rating and excited to be instructing in the sims again, but I'm also very burnt out after this whole process. I'm sure that being a busy single dad studying on my own didn't help at all. I've also learned that I'm well into the "old dogs learning new tricks" age bracket and had trouble keeping up with my 21 year old sim partner.

Congrats getting hired at my shop!

 

[bLizZuE]

Eagle never had a training center. They’ve always had a checking center. It’s not supposed to be this way.

 

[alaskadrifter]

Congrats getting hired at my shop!

 

[Cherokee_Cruiser]

Eagle never had a training center. They’ve always had a checking center. It’s not supposed to be this way.

Careful. Hell has no fury like a @Dacuj scorned.

 

[Kingairer]

How do you have one fleet type, that youve had forever, and still F up training program?

 

[Autothrust Blue]

How do you have one fleet type, that youve had forever, and still F up training program?

Because the people who wrote the program wanted to be home every night more than they wanted to do a good job writing the program?

 

[roundout]

How do you have one fleet type, that youve had forever, and still F up training program?

Because it's super important to know how many lights bulbs illuminate when the emergency exit lighting activates. Or how many rivets hold the wing together.