DCA Announcement possible moving to 142 school?

[Lostkpot]

Well I got a memo in my mailbox as did everyone else at DCA. Here it is.

The purpose of this letter is to bring you up to date with what the academy is doing in regards to the fleet.

As enrollments are not even from month to month, it is typical to have a large "bubble" of students in one fleet type. For example, last september we had a abnormally high enrollment. This group first puts a strain on the 152 fleet, then the 172 fleet as they go through instrument and so forth. The impact of having too many students is exponential as it causes each aircraft to fly more hours and almost doubles the amount of inspections required to be performed in a given month. For this reason, we try to supplement the fleet with leased aircraft. For example, last week we added two 152's to the fleet and anticipate and additional 172 this week. That aircraft is currently having new avionics installed. We will continue to monitor and adjust the fleet side.

We have to have a "Fleet Plan" for the future as well and I thought you'd be intrested in knowing what direction we are going with regard to this also. We are in the development and soon will be in the proposal phase of a Part 142 Program. Under part 142, level 6 flight training devices are required. A level 6 flight training device has exact "control loading" and duplicates the aircraft down to the smallest detail. Given these flight training devices, and new aircraft to match, a much greater precentage of time can be accomplished on the ground.

You may have seen cirrus aircraft on our ramp latley. We brought those in to evaluate their use as our training aircraft of the future. We are also evaluating proposals received from Cirrus and Aerosim, for the flight training devices.

It is not known for certain that we'll end up with the Cirrus but we have known for sometime we want glass cockpits, which was not available a few short years ago. If we go with 142, all current single engine aircraft would be replaced with new aircraft.

**** ****** is currently assigned head up of this project. As far as the time frame, this is a big project, so if you are a student today, you likley will complete your ratings prior to implementaion and may be viewing it from afar (Right seat in a RJ)

 

[planediveguy]

Now watch and see the conspiracy theorists coming up with all sorts of negative feedback from your post!

 

[flyguy]

I wouldn't say I have any sort of conspiracy theory, however If I were you guys I'd take it with a grain of salt. Of course admin wants to share future plans that may be good news to you. Dosn't mean it will happen though. I see things like this all the time at Sierra. Last year they told us we were getting all new cessnas, new sims, a level D 737 sim, we'd be replacing the BE-76s with Diamond Twin Stars, and we were getting a brand new facility. Well about half of that came true. The other half of those plans were either scrapped or are still in the "planning phase". Not saying I'm not happy with Sierra nor am I saying anyone should be unhappy with DCA or any other school when the "planning phase" becomes propoganda, then becomes nothing. That's just the reality of flight academy marketing. Its not that its untrue, its just that any ideas that come to the drawing board that make the future sound good you can be assured will end up in a memo.

 

[rausda27]

It's not a level D and I am sure it will come with an additional cost to the customer. What good is level 6 time anyway, students should be flying airplanes not simultors at this stage of their training. Planedive..is that quick enough for you..?

 

[FO_SHIZZLE]

I agree with you on that. Not a big fan of 142 programs or anything that up's the sim time and lessens the time in the aircraft. I will be long gone by the time any of this is implemented. I don't know if the students would care but it would hurt the instructors because it would be less flight time per lesson and therefore would translate into being an instructor for longer. It will be interesting to see how that is dealt with.

 

[DE727UPS]

It would be much better if you "conspiracy theorists" would stop posting at these "pathetic forums" and study your FAR's more. Shame on you.....

 

[rausda27]

[ QUOTE ]
It would be much better if you "conspiracy theorists" would stop posting at these "pathetic forums" and study your FAR's more. Shame on you.....

[/ QUOTE ]

Just think its typical how DCA spins a money making scheme into something that attempts to fool the student into thinking this will benefit them. Unless the sim time is approved into the 141 syllabus and a certain amount is allowed as a requirment to attain a rating, then it is scam.

 

[planediveguy]

You are finally getting the point!

 

[Kristie]

I'm pretty sure that Don forgot his

tag!

 

[Lostkpot]

yes kristie i added that for effect.

 

[ananoman]

[ QUOTE ]
Just think its typical how DCA spins a money making scheme into something that attempts to fool the student into thinking this will benefit them. Unless the sim time is approved into the 141 syllabus and a certain amount is allowed as a requirment to attain a rating, then it is scam.

[/ QUOTE ] That is a little over the top.

If they do this, then it will be under a new 142 syllabus, so no more worry over 141. I do agree with the others that 142 is a poor way to train initial pilots. It has been awhile since I looked into this, but the students only end up with a little more than half the airplane hours of a regular 141 student. When you consider that you only need around 190 hours to get your initial commercial under 141 and 50 hours of that can be in the sim, you see what the problem is. Updated FTDs for instrument training and for avionics training in the glass cockpit is fine, but I do not think less flying hours would benifit primary students.

Another big problem with 142 is once you start a program like this, it is very difficult to leave. Unless you can find another 142 school, you are screwed. You may have paid for much more sim time than can be credited to another 141 or 61 program. So make sure you really, really like the school before you sign up.

This is one of the problems with TAB (one of many), I am not sure if they are 142, but their program included something like 100 hours of FTD time. Once you are about half way through something like this, it is very difficult to transfer somewhere else. So it is good that most people with half a brain are smart enough not to go there.

Sadly, 142 is very attractive to flight schools. There is a high buy in cost to get the FTDs up and running, but after that they are cheaper than airplanes to run. No fuel, no engine overhauls, etc. For schools located in the North, there is also the weather factor. The weather can be what ever you want it to be in the FTD, so no training delays and lost revenue.

142 is great for advanced, aircraft specific training like type ratings, but that is where it should stay.

 

[FO_SHIZZLE]

My thoughts to the T. Well said.