I am not in admissions/marketing, administration or management, I am an instructor, so I can't really answer the question but I will say what I recall. When the school was Comair Aviation Academy and owned by Comair Airlines, instructors were placed in different airlines, but the majority went to Comair. From what I heard, CAA instructors comprised more of the training classes than any other school and there was preference for CAA instructors. Were CAA instructors the only people in their training class... absolutely not. CAA was not the only way to get to Comair Airlines, but percentages were better having gone through the academy of being accepted to the training class, especially at 1000 hours, than having attended another school. My assumption is that there was no need for a "Comair Direct" program, because that is where the majority went anyway. However, when the name was changed to Delta Connection Academy, and subsequently the Delta corporate flow chart was "amended" (I don't think DCA is owned by Comair Airlines anymore, I think there was some accounting paper shuffling, but I may be wrong), other Delta Connection carriers agreed to start interviewing and accepting more of DCA's instructors. If I recall correctly, the President of ASA was in Sanford for the name change "ceremony". Did ASA decide to accept more of 'our" instructors because of the name change, or was the name changed because ASA said they would start accepting more instructors if we did?? I don't know. And I am not trying to single out just ASA, but originally this was the airline asked about in regards to the Direct Track program at FSI. As far as that program, I am not sure if it was agreed upon prior to CAA changing to DCA, but I think it was. By no means am I trying to imply that FSI wouldn't have that program had CAA become DCA earlier. But FSI is not the only route to ASA, as DCA is not the only route to Comair. Instructors now have their choice to interview with any of the Delta Connection carriers that are hiring. I personally know instructors that just within the past 2 months have gone to Comair, ASA, Chatauqua, Skywest and Skyway. I agree that "Being the only school authorized to serve the entire Delta system" can be misleading because those airlines don't hire only from DCA, but... can any other school guarantee their instructors an interview with any Delta Connection carrier that they choose? I think this is what that statement is based upon. I would think that the marketing dept. at DCA is smart enough not to "falsely advertise". Play on words... sure, it is a business, but lie... no way. Do they need to use "grey area" marketing?? Probably not. But to be honest, the ads are working... advertising is meant to get attention, and they have certainly done that. They are not meant to sell. As far as taking advantage of the uninformed, who bases their decision on an ad? The ad gets people to call, ask questions and hopefully visit so that they become informed, not to take advantage of them and take money from people who don't know better. Again, I don't have numbers, cold hard facts or anything to back these statements up with, they are based on my memory (which sometimes fails me /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif) and my opinions.
