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what would you say the percentage of people who pass or fail
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Hum well in our class of now 12 people, one is repeating, he did a little too much partying his first attempt. I think in the first quiz 4 or 5 failed, the quizes are 50 questions each and cover the topics we studyed the previous week (held each monday) they have a combination of multible choice, fill in the blanks and connect the items and I would say a bit harder than the FAA questions, plus you need to get 80% to pass where as the FAA requires 70% on their tests. If you fail you are allowed to take it 2 more times and 3 strikes and your out, which I think is more than generious. 'Out' meaning your put on 'No Fly' and you'll have to wait till the next ground school to repeat. Only the one student failed 3 times and he opted to quit rather than wait till the next ground school in a month's time.
On the 2nd quiz I'm not sure but I don't think anyone failed it, after a rude shock for some from the first test I think they got their butts in gear and realised it would take more effort than their first attempt. I think some anticapated the first test to be easy or to be like 'high school' and got a shock when they found out it wasn't.
Now that people know what to expect I don't forsee any more failures. Plus with the higher standard we're being held to, once the actuall FAA exam comes around it will seem like a peice of cake in comparison.
Hope that answers some of your questions, and having come from university, the amount of study required is nothing new to me. Plus the fact I actually enjoy the materal makes it seem less like work.
Day 17 - Friday October 17th
Today we did more stuff on AIMs, which is a bit lighter than the FARs because it's practical stuff that you'll actually use, stuff like runway markings etc. I think everyone was glad friday was here, but with the test looming on monday I don't think much partying will be going on. On the contary a bunch of german students arrived in a rather 'jolly' state and there was a large (80 ppl or so) pool party. I actually didn't make it cause i had my first flight scheduled the next morning but I heard some good stories on monday.
Day 18 - Saturday October 18th - First Flight!
Alright, finally after being here for 2 weeks I get to go up for my first flight! The morning didn't start off real well however, I must have hit the off button on my alarm when it went off at 6am and went back to sleep. I then woke up later to find it was now 7:10am and I was suposed to get there at 7!
So I put on my clothes like lighting, grabed my stuff and ran down to the flight line, getting there about 7:20 (an advantage of living on campus!) My instructor was begining to wonder if I had forgoten completely.
Anyhow got the weather, did weight and ballance and went out and pre flighted the aircraft. I did all the taxing, take off and most of the flying, it's suposed to be a familarasation flight, so we checked out the training areas and I had such good aircraft control my instructor had me do a few extra manovers that I wasn't suposed to do until a few lessions later. Steep turns, climbing turns decending, stalls etc ( I guess all those years of playing flight sim wasn't a waste of time!
) My instructor landed the plane and did a quick debref, needless to say I was on a bit of a high for the rest of the day!
Spent pretty much the rest of the day writing up the aircraft written exam which I was suposed to have done before my first flight. Good to get it done but that meant all my studying for monday's quiz would have to be done on sunday.
Day 19 - Sunday October 19th
Today pretty much was a big study day, I just read all the chapters I hadn't read durring the week (dam baseball) plus all the homework I didn't get finished.
Day 20 - Monday October 20th - Quiz 2 - Flight 2
Well today I spent the morning craming in some review question, cursing I hadn't done them earlier. Anyhow I took the quiz and got 96%, it took a great deal longer than the first time, the flight computer and w&b questions took a fair about of time. Actually i was kinda annoyed that I got all the hard questions right and the 3 questions I missed were really easy.. doh ah well guess it's better to get the hard ones right than wrong, the easy stuff is simple to correct. The other guys who got in the 80s were saying I was crazy to be complaining about my score, but I won't be totatly happy unless I get 100% and it was definatly acheivable.
Just a mere 1.5hrs after finishing the quiz I had my 2nd flight scheduled. I went back to my room to 'chill' a bit I was actually kinda stressed after the quiz, I had been doing questions in one form or another since 9am that morning (now 2pm)
Did all the usal pre-flight stuff, I'd say having done the 5 microsoft lessons before hand really helped me to get the checklists down and the proceedures like V speeds and how to fly the pattern, when I got into the plane the first time, none of it was new to me. Plus I had spent some time sitting in the cockpit by myself beforehand going over checklist, turning those memory items into actual hand movements (it helps a lot, I definatly suguest you get some cockpit time, plus it's free)
We did some more manovres, this time some slow flight, more turns, steep climbs. I wish I had my camera cause the sunset looked really awsome from 3000ft. When it was time to come back to the field it was getting dark and so came on the nav lights. We were cleared a direct in and since i was flying the approach so well my instructor let me flight it all the way in. He said it's really rare for him to let a student land unassisted on his 2nd flight, on top of that it was a night landing! After shutting down he told me all those hours on MSFS really must have helped,and he jokenly told me next lesson he'll hop out and let me go shoot some solo ILS approachs at melbourne lol
I replyed, well do you think I've chosen the right career path? hehe
Needless to say I think my feet were barely touching the ground on the walk back to the dorms!
After I got back I decided to reward myself for a good day's work and went and bought myself a playstation 2 with a couple of games with the graduation money I had accumulated. My roommate and I stayed up late playing PS2 all evening, no study for us tonight!
Day 21 - Tuesday October 21st
Today we started learning about weather and flight instruments, which is cool because i find the weather is a fasinating subject, it is ever changing and never totaly predictable, it's the thing that makes flying a challenge. We also had a tour of the maintance hanger, the floor was shiney, I kid you not, very professional. The head mechanic gave us an indepth tour of the systems on the Cadet and gave us a few good pointers on what items to check during pre-flight. After that it was more classes on weather and flight instruments and the evening was spent largely reading up on the materal. Oh and tuesday is two for one at the pizza place so we had that for dinner.
Day 22 - Wednesday October 22nd - Flight 3
Well today I had an early flight, breif time was 8am so not as bad as Satuday, plus I made sure to get up with plenty of time to spair this time. It was a bit foggy and vis was down to 2sm, so only the IFR guys could leave, the weather breifing room was much busier than normal as 15 odd students hung around waiting for the fog to lift, by the time i had done pre flight paperwork the vis had gone to 3sm and we were good to go. Today we did some touch and goes and then went north to do some slow flight and stalls,this time we were over the coast which was cool since I hadn't seen it yet. Came in to land and we landed 29R and had to hold short 29L for about 5 mins, I'm guessing there was a flood of traffic that left as soon as the fog and lifted and now 1.5hrs or so later they were all coming in, 4 or so planes landed before we were cleared to cross the rwy, plus the ramp was a bit of a traffic jam, heck you would have though we were in Atlanta or somthing! I heard reports of a trainee controler so that might have had somthing to do with it too. I told my instructor, gee you'd sware we were working for the airlines already with all this traffic, lol
After the flight had a bit of free time until afternoon classes. more weather and flight instruments. Tonight I think I'll finish the weather reading, which I'm instrested in anyhow.
*Thew!* Well congratulation if you managed to read this far! today is really the first time I've had time to get on the net since Thurday, but I think I'm caught up now.
In summery I'm having a totally cool time, doing somthing your interested in really makes the classes and study go quicker, if I wasn't sure I wanted to be a professional pilot before I'm certain now!
Till next time....