Jet Time as a Minimum..

Pilotdude3407 said:
The only people I hear bitch about a college degree are those that don't have one and are pissed because despite their 8000 hours as a captain, they know they will never even been considered for a job at a major airline. I feel pity for them.
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I already have my seniority number at a major airline. In fact, the major airline that many pilots put at the top of their list. I'm not planning on going anywhere, so my scoffing at the silly degree requirement has nothing to do with that. It's just a silly requirement.
 
I've got a fair amount of time in a boring little civilian jet and a pretty substantial amount of time in various boring civilian turboprops. I don't think the jet was "harder" (in fact in a lot of ways it was easier), but it was different. Roughly, say, as different from a turboprop as a turboprop is from a piston twin, maybe? Hey, I do it, too. I mean, really, how much different from the beatchjet can a 747-400 be? They're both jets, they both cruise in the flightlevels, they both have FMSes and two pilots. So why isn't Atlas calling? No fair! Discrimination! ;)
 
All aircraft have differences, some more than others.

A friend who was an international 74 left seat was taking a refresher before taking his family in a 4-place piston single. He kept flaring 50 feet above the runway.
 
Pilotdude3407 said:
It is sad you feel like that. Education should never be looked at as a poor investment. To be honest though, I didn't see the value in it until after I got in the workforce and I realized how valuable it was to have. Nonetheless you have put in 4yrs of hard work that someone next to you might not have and you will be rewarded for it before they will, and I guarantee it will make you feel good then.
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I dont feel good at the expense of my fellow man, frankly a college degree is a poor investment if you're on looking for a return on it. Better off to gave a trade. I love learning, and hell, I've got 175caught college credits with about 60to upper division. Any of the knowledge I've gotten from it I could have picked up with a library card and an internet connection. It hasn't made me or anyone else a "better" pilot -days it just means you put in the time. Frankly college isn't even hard. Even technical subjects aren't that difficult at the undergraduate level.

My biggest fear about the industry is that this will become even more of a rich mans game and unless you want to beholden to the banks, you cannot learn to fly and go to college without debt if you don't have money going into it from the get go. Bit of a run on, I know, but this coming from my phone in the crew van. Kthxbai
 
ppragman said:
Frankly college isn't even hard. Even technical subjects aren't that difficult at the undergraduate level.
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I think this very much depends on where you go to school and what you study. I did not find college "easy" by any stretch of the imagination, but conversely I did find it rewarding...
 
RightSeatGirl said:
No I agree with this. I do understand about req'd mins, insurance wants, operational diffs etc..This was really more about a pointless 250 jet minimum just to check some box. 250 jet, does not a jet pilot make, lol. If jet time is required then make it substantial enough to where the experience actually has merrit vs. just a reason to move someone's resume to another pile...I get the need for that kind of qualifier from an HR standpoint but there are other qualifiers that make more sense as they deliver at least some ration behind them.
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I would venture out to say that my Dash8 is just as hard to fly, and just as complex as any ERJ or CRJ out there. The biggest difference, I have to do everything where the RJ's do it for you most of the time.
 
No, I'm not worthy. Apparently:

4 thowsind owers end uh nooooooooooooooo AY TEE PEE or koledge deegree maykes me 2 stoopid 2 fly da bigg fassssssst pwanes......
 
I don't either. But if I want some, I think as someone else said, often you have to make the sacrifice because someone is willing to take you on as a risk. Could I learn to fly one? Absolutely, but only certain companies and operations are willing to take the risk. I don't feel that I'm not worthy, however.
 
Boris Badenov said:
I think this very much depends on where you go to school and what you study. I did not find college "easy" by any stretch of the imagination, but conversely I did find it rewarding...
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Its not easy. But its not hard. I'm doing "professional piloting" to finish off my degree - and frankly, that's a joke. Most of my formal education before I came down south has been Russian/Anthropology and Math. Even the upper division math and russian classes weren't hard provided you put in the time and effort to do well in them. I found school frustrating not because of the difficulty of it, rather due to the necessity to reign in and specialize in a specific topic. Independent thinking is only authorized in certain classes, and only to the extent that it doesn't go outside the scope of the course material. What's hard is studying and working a full time flying job - which is the only way I could afford to continue to go without adding even more debt. This is in part why I switched to a BS in BS, rather than continuing my education in what I'm passionate about.

That doesn't mean I'm not learning, rather, I understand what college is. The university system was developed to produce good productive members of society / debt slaves who will work regardless of the conditions (my barrista in Eugene, Oregon had a masters degree). There's nothing "classified" that you learn at school, it's all freely available. The social experience is nice, but getting hammered on the weekends at frat parties wasn't really for me, plus most of my friends were work related - which I've done full time since I started school. If I were to go back and do it over again, I'd have paid off my flying debt before starting on a degree.

That doesn't mean it's not useful, or that I haven't learned a lot - but college a better pilot does not make.
 
I could get jet time easy if I wanted to take a $15k 1st year pay hit and go to another regional...But I suppose if my short half a decade in this biz has taught me anything it's all about...


QOL Baby!
 
RightSeatGirl said:
I could get jet time easy if I wanted to take a $15k 1st year pay hit and go to another regional...But I suppose if my short half a decade in this biz has taught me anything it's all about...


QOL Baby!
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Bingo. Sacrifices to get ahead. I could transition to a sister company in a jet, but I would take a QOL hit.
 
RightSeatGirl said:
No I agree with this. I do understand about req'd mins, insurance wants, operational diffs etc..This was really more about a pointless 250 jet minimum just to check some box. 250 jet, does not a jet pilot make, lol. If jet time is required then make it substantial enough to where the experience actually has merrit vs. just a reason to move someone's resume to another pile...I get the need for that kind of qualifier from an HR standpoint but there are other qualifiers that make more sense as they deliver at least some ration behind them.
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This is interesting. 250 doesn't make you a jet pilot but 250 can make you an instructor? You think 250 hours is enough time to show "merit" with regards to teaching another person how to fly? I don't see anyone here complaining that they have to get 250TT before someone will give them a chance at a CFI position. There are job minimums all up and down the "pilot chain".

Also, turbine is turbine in my book and as I am searching for a pilot. I know I want someone with TJ time but only from the perspective of the speed at which things happen, not that the time makes them more "worthy".

I don't think my 1,000hr single pilot jet makes me better or worse than the next pilot. But it does let me "check a box". As I have in the past and even today as I look for a job, I get a little disappointed with position requirements but only when I don't meet them. :)

Side note and IMHO: RSG, there is NO reason to not have your ATP if you meet the hour requirement. It doesn't make you a better pilot but it shows that you seek to improve and demand higher of yourself.
 
dustoff17 said:
Side note and IMHO: RSG, there is NO reason to not have your ATP if you meet the hour requirement. It doesn't make you a better pilot but it shows that you seek to improve and demand higher of yourself.
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No reason huh....

















































































































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Nope..not one... at least 2500 of them.....
 
To the guys hating on the college degree...

I think where you go to school and what you do has a lot to do with your opinions on it. The biggest thing I believe it shows though is that you're teachable in a formal environment which is exactly where you'll be if you get hired by many of the 121 operators or end up at Flight Safety I would imagine (I've never done a Flight Safety course). The piece of paper you get from a 4 year school just shows you can deal with a bunch of BS, maybe learn a thing or two, and stay committed to it. I have met some incredibly stupid people though that have the piece of paper.
 
dustoff17 said:
I wrote "no reason", not excuse.........;)

Without it, what's the cost in the long run?
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Oh I dunno...being able to do nifty things like say...eat! And since you seem to be in a position where $2500 ain't no thing then hows about you shoot me a check!

Dude, seriously! I work for a turbo-prop REG ION AL! $2500 may as well be $25,000! Hell my bills have bills...
 
I've met some no-joke MORONS who have PhDs. I don't think there's any question but that college has largely become a box to check. That said, I don't think it's fair to tar them all with the same brush. I can say with my hand held high to Cthulhu that my college experience did not resemble ppragman's in any way.
 
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