I Wish Our Website Was As Good As This

[Lasham Pilot]

<a
href="http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk">http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk</a>

[nimbus]

very nice internet site indeed.
Bravo for the web designer !


Lasham Pilot a écrit :
> <a
> href="http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk">http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk</a>

[Robert Ehrlich]

nimbus wrote:
> very nice internet site indeed.
> Bravo for the web designer !
>
>
> Lasham Pilot a écrit :
>
>><a
>>href="http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk">http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk</a>
>
>
>
Maybe it's a good web design, but from a pilot's point of
view, some statements are questionable :

On weekends there is a task briefing covering the weather, airspace, and
three tasks of varying difficulty. Pilots choose which one they want to
fly, program it into their flight computers (so they don't get lost) and
set off.


I don't agree with the idea that, without a flight computer in which
I program my task, I would be lost. As an instructor, I merely teach how
to avoid getting lost, without any flight computer. Of course I
also explain how to use flight computers and GPS, when available, but
a pilot must be able to maintain situation awareness without them.

[7C]

Hi Robert,


> Pilots choose which one they want to
> fly, program it into their flight computers (so they don't get lost) and
> set off.

I take all the blame for poorly worded webpages. But in fairness, the
general public relates to SatNav & getting lost! I seriously doubt
saying, 'we program our flight computers so we don't accidentally break
airspace and cause a major incident' would be appropriate :)

I am quite interested in peoples views as this site is an experiment -
it's designed totally for non-gliding people. I've tried to keep the
text as accurate as possible, without getting bogged down in a morass
of technicalities! As a club we need to attract more members & more
trial lessons - and this site is aimed at getting people from outside
of the gliding movement.

Personally, I set about making a site that would help break some of the
stereotypes associated with gliding. For example, I wanted people to
discover that gliders CAN go cross country or do aerobatics, that they
aren't just blown by the wind. Having done a lot of gliding publicity
events I know that these misconceptions are rife (in the UK at least)
and are not doing our sport any favours! Why would anybody want to
take up a sport that they perceive as a lot of standing around for a
simple drift back to the ground?

It's too early to tell if it's working - but we're not selling any less
'vouchers' than before, so I guess that's a start!

Mel

[Soarin Again]

Nice website

For release the glider appears to move out to the right,
releases and flies straight while the Pawnee split
S's to the right. Is this the normal release procedure
in England?

[Dan G]

7C wrote:

> As a club we need to attract more members & more
> trial lessons - and this site is aimed at getting people from outside
> of the gliding movement.

Mel, from my experience, selling vouchers and getting new people on the
airfield isn't the problem when it comes to membership. It's convincing
them to spend six hours a day at the field for just three flights on an
on-going basis that's the problem!

Cambridge is the only club in the UK I know of that's cracked that, via
their booking system.


Dan

[Z Goudie]

At 10:06 12 January 2007, Soarin Again wrote:
>For release the glider appears to move out to the right,
>releases and flies straight while the Pawnee split
>S's to the right. Is this the normal release procedure
>in England?

No. The release method used by this BRITISH pilot is
to pull up until the ropes nice and tight before releasing
to be sure that the tug pilot knows I've gone. I find
the resultant pitch departure also prevents them becoming
blase about the result of an accidental tug upset at
low levels.

[Neil]

> I am quite interested in peoples views as this site is an experiment -
> it's designed totally for non-gliding people.


The previous version of the site was pretty good, and made my own UK
clubsite look pretty poor (but then it was anyway). The new site is very
good. Good pictures, nice text, imho. Well laid out; easy to get
around; and clearly aimed at the public as you admit.

I just wonder, do you have your own non-public "members" section imbedded
for use by those who know how, for club data, rosters, documents etc?

Neil

[W.J. \(Bill\) Dean \(U.K.\).]

Use the button "pilots", then "members site", and you will find the old
website for now.

Yes, Melissa has done a good job, and she flies her LS4 in Nationals as
well.

Have a look at the on-line booking system at "Motor glider bookings", better
than a casual system!

W.J. (Bill) Dean (U.K.).
Remove "ic" to reply.

>
>"Neil" > wrote in message
...
>
>> I am quite interested in peoples views as this site is an experiment -
>> it's designed totally for non-gliding people.
>
>
> The previous version of the site was pretty good, and made my own UK
> clubsite look pretty poor (but then it was anyway). The new site is
> very good. Good pictures, nice text, imho. Well laid out; easy to
> get around; and clearly aimed at the public as you admit.
>
> I just wonder, do you have your own non-public "members" section imbedded
> for use by those who know how, for club data, rosters, documents etc?
>
> Neil
>

[Ian]

Dan G wrote:

> Mel, from my experience, selling vouchers and getting new people on the
> airfield isn't the problem when it comes to membership. It's convincing
> them to spend six hours a day at the field for just three flights on an
> on-going basis that's the problem!

Absolutely. A quick glance at the statistics in S&G will show that
gliding attracts plenty of people - and then loses them again. Even
though many customers have no intention of taking more than the trial
lesson (not a joyride. dear me not a joyride. certainly not a joyride.
a nice, legal, trial lesson), the attrition rate for those who do join
is dreadful.

And I am afraid that's down to clubs and members, many of whom think
that learning to glide is a) a good trial of character and b) a source
of unpaid ground labour for private owners. Let's face it, learning to
glide - or trying to learn to glide - can be a miserable experience.

Ian

[Michael Ash]

Ian > wrote:
> Absolutely. A quick glance at the statistics in S&G will show that
> gliding attracts plenty of people - and then loses them again. Even
> though many customers have no intention of taking more than the trial
> lesson (not a joyride. dear me not a joyride. certainly not a joyride.
> a nice, legal, trial lesson), the attrition rate for those who do join
> is dreadful.

I started out with my club this past summer. By an interesting
coincidence, three other guys also started out at almost the same time as
I did. We didn't all show up all the time, but we often shared our
instructor, helped push each other out, had ground instruction together,
talked over our different experiences, etc. I even started carpooling to
the airport with one of them who happens to live nearby.

Now only my carpool buddy and I are left. Some times I even have my doubts
about him, but that's probably because he's progressing slower and isn't
able to fly as often. Of the other two, one had Real Life intervene and
the other got frustrated with the amount of not-flying he was doing. (He
was keeping a running count of the number of times he had come to the
airport and not been able to fly, due to some bad luck with scheduling and
mechanical problems. I think he got up to five or six.)

> And I am afraid that's down to clubs and members, many of whom think
> that learning to glide is a) a good trial of character and b) a source
> of unpaid ground labour for private owners. Let's face it, learning to
> glide - or trying to learn to glide - can be a miserable experience.

I don't have experience with other operations, but as far as I can tell my
club is very good about this. And yet I still see a lot of fresh faces
come... and go.

Maybe it's just inherent in a complicated activity that takes a lot of
dedication that people will drop out. We always hear about how gym
memberships surge after the New Year, then 90% of the new members stop
going after a little while.

I have a bit of perspective from the other side. I did powered training
many years ago, up to and a bit past solo, then quit. The reasons are
complicated but I think a big one is that it was just too daunting. Flying
looks (and is!) fun, but there are a lot of rules and procedures and
little details to know.

When we imagine flying before we start learning it, it's often the classic
"kick the tires and light the fires". The reality can be a letdown from
that, whether it's remembering all the right things to say on the radio or
getting up before dawn so you can help wrestle the club ships out of the
hangar, then sit around for a couple of hours before it's your turn in the
tow list. Of course the plusses far outweigh the minuses, but this sudden
realization that there is actual work involved can be a downer.

The club environment can be a big help there. When you're not flying you
get to talk about flying with a variety of interesting people with
contagious enthusiasm, and see and hear the kinds of things you'll be able
to do as you become more advanced. But even then, a lot of people don't
stick with it.

What more can be done? (An honest question, not rhetorical.)

--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software

[Sandy Stevenson]

It's interesting to see that this is apparently a world wide problem.
The post below could have been written from my club in Canada.
My view of it is that we have to improve support for new member-pilots
by
improving the number of flights per day that they get, and by
shortening the
solo and licence cycles. We've seen Cambridge's booking system, and
started a simplified booking system of our own last season. This year
we're trying to
improve it by assignng students to an instructor and a two seat
aircraft in
pairs for 90 minute blocks. When there's no lift, we're hoping this
will get each
student 2 to 3 flights each during the block.
Since we can only fly six months of the year, we're hoping to solo and
licence people sooner with this system.
>From a previous post on this topic, it appears that there's some
circumstance in the UK where trial flights must be introductory lesson
flights. We don't necessarily have that as a formal restriction, but
obviously we do make the first lesson available to people coming out
for a flight. We are able to recognize, however, that some people just
want to go up for the sake of saying they've done it. They never intend
to learn to fly. We try to look after them as well, since we make
money from their flights.
Hopefully Mel will write back in a few months and let us know what the
results from her website have been. It certainly puts anything we have
in our club to shame, or anything else I've seen in Canada, even York
Soaring's site, which is pretty decent.





Michael Ash wrote:
> Ian > wrote:
> > Absolutely. A quick glance at the statistics in S&G will show that
> > gliding attracts plenty of people - and then loses them again. Even
> > though many customers have no intention of taking more than the trial
> > lesson (not a joyride. dear me not a joyride. certainly not a joyride.
> > a nice, legal, trial lesson), the attrition rate for those who do join
> > is dreadful.
>
> I started out with my club this past summer. By an interesting
> coincidence, three other guys also started out at almost the same time as
> I did. We didn't all show up all the time, but we often shared our
> instructor, helped push each other out, had ground instruction together,
> talked over our different experiences, etc. I even started carpooling to
> the airport with one of them who happens to live nearby.
>
> Now only my carpool buddy and I are left. Some times I even have my doubts
> about him, but that's probably because he's progressing slower and isn't
> able to fly as often. Of the other two, one had Real Life intervene and
> the other got frustrated with the amount of not-flying he was doing. (He
> was keeping a running count of the number of times he had come to the
> airport and not been able to fly, due to some bad luck with scheduling and
> mechanical problems. I think he got up to five or six.)
>
> > And I am afraid that's down to clubs and members, many of whom think
> > that learning to glide is a) a good trial of character and b) a source
> > of unpaid ground labour for private owners. Let's face it, learning to
> > glide - or trying to learn to glide - can be a miserable experience.
>
> I don't have experience with other operations, but as far as I can tell my
> club is very good about this. And yet I still see a lot of fresh faces
> come... and go.
>
> Maybe it's just inherent in a complicated activity that takes a lot of
> dedication that people will drop out. We always hear about how gym
> memberships surge after the New Year, then 90% of the new members stop
> going after a little while.
>
> I have a bit of perspective from the other side. I did powered training
> many years ago, up to and a bit past solo, then quit. The reasons are
> complicated but I think a big one is that it was just too daunting. Flying
> looks (and is!) fun, but there are a lot of rules and procedures and
> little details to know.
>
> When we imagine flying before we start learning it, it's often the classic
> "kick the tires and light the fires". The reality can be a letdown from
> that, whether it's remembering all the right things to say on the radio or
> getting up before dawn so you can help wrestle the club ships out of the
> hangar, then sit around for a couple of hours before it's your turn in the
> tow list. Of course the plusses far outweigh the minuses, but this sudden
> realization that there is actual work involved can be a downer.
>
> The club environment can be a big help there. When you're not flying you
> get to talk about flying with a variety of interesting people with
> contagious enthusiasm, and see and hear the kinds of things you'll be able
> to do as you become more advanced. But even then, a lot of people don't
> stick with it.
>
> What more can be done? (An honest question, not rhetorical.)
>
> --
> Michael Ash
> Rogue Amoeba Software

[jcarlyle]

I think the main problem with dropouts is that people decide to start
soaring with insufficient information about the requirements and/or
insufficient thought about what the process will demand from them. Part
of this stems from the fact that the clubs don't want to scare off
prospective members, while other parts of it are due to wishful
thinking and even outright laziness on the part of the prospect.

Perhaps we should sell soaring more like the military special forces
sell themselves to potential recruits: people know going in that
it's very tough, and that most won't make it. The elitism, of
course, present problems of its own, but the special forces don't
seem to lack recruits. Another time honored way is to treat family
members, good friends and neighbors to an orientation flight, and then
closely mentor them through the difficult learning phase if they show
true interest in flying.

In my case I was willing to endure practically anything to become a
pilot, due to my dreams, temperament and family history. Need to wait
for good weather? No problem. Need to study hard to pass the FAA
written exam? No problem. Need to make lots of flights to master the
various required flight skills due to being middle aged? No problem. I
didn't need a mentor, and I didn't mind the monetary or time costs.

Obviously, I don't have an answer to the problem. What I do know is
that the number of pilots in the US are dropping year by year. Most
people who show up at a glider port are not as single minded as me, and
creative means must be devised to attract new pilots to the sport.

-John

[Martin Gregorie[_1_]]

Sandy Stevenson wrote:
>
> solo and licence cycles. We've seen Cambridge's booking system, and
> started a simplified booking system of our own last season. This year
> we're trying to improve it by assignng students to an instructor and a two seat
> aircraft in pairs for 90 minute blocks. When there's no lift, we're hoping this
> will get each student 2 to 3 flights each during the block.
>
I'm a Cambridge pilot who went solo before the booking system was
introduced and then, for reasons that are not relevant to this thread,
needed to re-solo last year. As a result I've done the pre-solo thing
both with and without the booking system in place.

The upside is that ab initios get to fly with minimal waiting around.
The downside is that students and club members wanting two seat time are
much less likely to turn up "on spec", so the launch point is more
likely to be short-handed and, worse, people who know the ropes are in
short supply. This is probably more of a problem with winching than for
aero towing but it certainly makes smooth operations more difficult if
you're trying to run both flight lines.

A side effect is that there are many fewer people around the launch
point to talk to, so the perceived friendliness of the club is reduced.

This isn't an attack on the booking system which, in general, works
well. However it does flag up the issues I've mentioned. Maybe my
experience makes then more obvious than they would be to a first time
student: I can't tell. I've thought about it and can't see an easy
solution to these downsides but maybe somebody cleverer than me can come
up with good ideas.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

[Tony Verhulst]

> gliding attracts plenty of people - and then loses them again. ....
> the attrition rate for those who do join is dreadful.

This is a long standing (and known) issue in the airplane training
community, although I expect it's worse in gliding. From the National
Association of Flight Instructors
http://www.nafinet.org/news/2002%20-%2005_06%20-%20NAFI%20Sport%20Pilot%20Comments%20Submitted%20T o%20FAA.html
-

Re: the new US sport pilot rating: "Lower entry barriers could reverse
the long-standing dropout rate of student pilots"

and

"A major problem in flight training is the “drop-out” factor; a
situation that sees many people complete a few hours of training,
perhaps even through solo flight, then lose interest. We need to uncover
why that occurs and take steps to remedy it...."

Tony V.

[Michael Ash]

Sandy Stevenson > wrote:
> It's interesting to see that this is apparently a world wide problem.
> The post below could have been written from my club in Canada.
> My view of it is that we have to improve support for new member-pilots
> by
> improving the number of flights per day that they get, and by
> shortening the
> solo and licence cycles. We've seen Cambridge's booking system, and
> started a simplified booking system of our own last season. This year
> we're trying to
> improve it by assignng students to an instructor and a two seat
> aircraft in
> pairs for 90 minute blocks. When there's no lift, we're hoping this
> will get each
> student 2 to 3 flights each during the block.
> Since we can only fly six months of the year, we're hoping to solo and
> licence people sooner with this system.

The idea of a booking system seems like a good idea. I don't know if our
club is big enough for it (3 gliders, 1 tow plane) but often this summer I
was out at the field getting one flight per day, with my fellow students
who were also getting one flight per day, thinking that it work just as
well and be a lot less driving if we came out half as often and got two
flights per day.

Martin's point about a booking system making for an emptier airfield has
some merit to it, and I'm not sure how I feel about that. Maybe having
better instructor/student coordination would be better, but it's hard to
see how. We can e-mail the instructor ahead of time and ask if he has room
for another student one day, but there's no good way for two students to
notice that they're both flying on both Saturday and Sunday and arrange it
so they each fly one day, but with more flights.

Simply flying more often overall would be good as well, but I'm not sure
that can be done without obtaining more equipment or people, as our
gliders/instructors tend to be completely booked all day when a number of
students are at the field.

> From a previous post on this topic, it appears that there's some
> circumstance in the UK where trial flights must be introductory lesson
> flights. We don't necessarily have that as a formal restriction, but
> obviously we do make the first lesson available to people coming out
> for a flight. We are able to recognize, however, that some people just
> want to go up for the sake of saying they've done it. They never intend
> to learn to fly. We try to look after them as well, since we make
> money from their flights.

Officially, our club only offers instructional flights, and only to
members. (This being club rules, not government.) Unofficially, anybody
can be a temporary member for a month for a reasonable fee, and our
instructors are happy to accomodate anything from "teach me to fly!" to "I
just want to get some good pictures". And as you say, we make money from
it so we like them all.

--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software

[Bill Daniels]

Gliding, by its very nature is dependent on weather and as such, very
resistent to precise scheduling. Schedules usually go hayware by the second
hour. Flight training is time intensive and its made worse by the
one-to-one relatioship of instructor to student. The need to get glider,
instructor and weather aligned so that some instruction can take place is
very frustrating to the student. The student may take some solace in the
fact that those trying to provide instruction are frustrated by the same
things.

It even seems to me that trying to force flight instruction into a
pre-conceived time structure lessens the value of instruction. Often the
schedule forces and end to a session just as the studnet is achieving some
breakthrough. The student who could benefit from some intense follow
through is chased away to make time for the next student. This is really
not a good use of either the students time or the instructors.

Well, what can be done? Lasham seems to have had good experiences with
wintertime instruction using a flight simulator. However, I don't have
acccess to that equipment. What I have done is use Condor Flight Simulator
as an "animated white board" to illustrate maneuvers in an interesting and
entertaining way in a ground school setting. This produces a well prepared
student whose actual flight training progresses much faster than without the
ground school. Ground school is a LOT easier to schedule than flight
instruction.

Ground school can take place much closer to where most students live and
classes can have ten or more students. This doesn't in itself solve the
scheduling problem but it does accelerate the students progress which
lessens the frustration.

If really good simulators were widely available, they might have some real
impact on student retention. I've had some speculative conversations with
students along the lines of asking how they would feel if every maneuver was
practised on a simulator before is was attempted in flight. I sensed that
this would provide great releif to students fearful of certain maneuvers.
Im sure that this sense of unease has driven off more than a few students.

Bill Daniels

[7C]

In typically impeccable timing (for this discussion at least!), our CFI
has just put out a proposal for accelerating pilots through to the XC
phase (See the newsletter at
http://www.londonglidingclub.co.uk/gliderpilots.xml). In particular it
highlights a coordinated booking and instructor system aimed at keeping
students flying with the same instructors. To me it looks like a good
balance.

Perhaps, though, we are all so focused on the flying that we forget
that most of us still fly because of our friends. (Admit it it's not a
sign of weakness!) And, in this vein, it's great to see that SOSA (the
friendliest club I've ever flown at) is doing so well. I wonder how
much of their growth and success is because it's really very welcoming
and relaxed?! Lets face it, who wants to spend a whole day somewhere
where people don't even bother to learn your name?

Let's attract people who have a better idea of what gliding actually
is, then make sure they don't leave by bringing them into the
community. Let's not ditch them at the worst point in their flying
career (endless post solo check flights), and let's share our
enthusiasm with everybody who walks onto the airfield!

It is a great sport after all - why are we so shy at talking to people
who haven't proven their long term staying power? (Or who can only
just spare enough time to book a slot!)

Mel
[sorry, couldn't resist the touchy feely today!]

[Dan G]

I've spoken to many club members who didn't come back for a second year
of gliding. The main reason given was, indeed, the intrusion of "real
life". However drilling down it was more that they could not afford to
invest a whole day on the airfield, *especially* given that they only
got two or three flights out of it. (BTW, no-one told me they'd left
because it seemed too hard or there was too much to learn, although I
understand that could potentially be a factor.)

These scheduling/booking systems mentioned only amount to making sure
that there's x number of instructors on the field for a period of a few
hours, with y number of students to fly with. We're not talking slots
of 9.15, 9.30 etc.

I spent a weekend at Cambridge last summer and talked to, well,
everyone about their system. As Martin says they have less people on
the field, but no-one deemed it a problem, more something that just
needed to gotten used to.

This one simple system could have a dramatic effect on membership
progression and retention. The problem is getting it introduced. Anyone
in the UK who watched "Can Gerry Robinson Fix the NHS?" knows exactly
what I mean when I say that anyone I talk to tells me "but it's not the
way we do things". I understand Cambridge had this problem, and
conviced the large majority people before railroading the remaing
stubborn few :-).

Let me give an example. Last summer I organised flying on Friday
evenings. Via e-mail I'd arrange winch drivers and instructors. Then
I'd let three students come per each instructor, and everyone got to
fly three times in just three hours (instead of the usual six+).

Then I wrote a webpage (Zoho Creator) which basically did all this for
me. Every time an instructor signed up, the system allowed three more
students to book. It even has RSS feeds so students can be alerted as
soon as more slots are available.

Could I get this introduced? Could I heck! People couldn't grasp that
it wasn't any different from what I'd been doing manually. Luckily a
more forward-thinking instructor has "seen the light" and we're working
on getting it running this summer. My dream is that eventually the
whole club will use the system for all days...


Dan

[Michel Talon]

Bill Daniels <bildan@comcast-dot-net> wrote:
>
> If really good simulators were widely available, they might have some real
> impact on student retention.

From what i have seen, the problem is not only student retention, but
also retention of people at all levels of experience. Here around Paris,
young students frequently succeed in doing the whole formation in just
one summer holidays, but will they come back next year? Supposing they
come back and do the 50km, 300 km next year will they continue up to
500km and further? In many cases after some years people get tired and
drop out. A much bigger influx of newcomers would be necessary to
support persistence of activity. Last summer i went visit a club in
south of France, near Bayonne, which i know has several plastic gliders,
Pegase, ASK21, etc. There was fine wheather, and it was during holidays.
I found closed doors! I am convinced that drastic measures to augment
attractivity to young people, reduce price, etc. are absolutely
necessary for survival of this sport.

--

Michel TALON

[Sandy Stevenson]

So, Dan, any chance we could get a look at your website for scheduling?
Sounds intriguing.
Concerning our current plans, we may refine it some more, but as I
currently understand it, our plan is to book only one of our two
seaters with an instructor and students this tightly. The other two
seater and both single seats will be able to be booked, but are
available for ad hoc flights if they are not booked.
The primary users of the other two seater are intro rides, solo
students, and licenced pilots wanting to take family or friends up.
The points made about weather scrambling schedules are right, so we
plan to rotate each group through the 8 available slots each weekend to
give each student a fair chance at some soaring flights, and equal
exposure to the risk of weather delays.
Part of the flexibility of the system we're trying to achieve, and I
doubt it's going to be a perfect system, just better than what we have
had, is that nothing prevents a second instructor from using the second
two seater for additional instruction if it's not otherwise booked.
Given that our field has facilities for campers, and many people do
overnight at the field, if the lift is poor many of our cross country
pilots are also instructors, so there are days when the additional
instruction opportunities do come about.
Hopefully we'll make our ab initio students feel that their time and
contribution is valued and we'll improve our retention rates.


Dan G wrote:
> I've spoken to many club members who didn't come back for a second year
> of gliding. The main reason given was, indeed, the intrusion of "real
> life". However drilling down it was more that they could not afford to
> invest a whole day on the airfield, *especially* given that they only
> got two or three flights out of it. (BTW, no-one told me they'd left
> because it seemed too hard or there was too much to learn, although I
> understand that could potentially be a factor.)
>
> These scheduling/booking systems mentioned only amount to making sure
> that there's x number of instructors on the field for a period of a few
> hours, with y number of students to fly with. We're not talking slots
> of 9.15, 9.30 etc.
>
> I spent a weekend at Cambridge last summer and talked to, well,
> everyone about their system. As Martin says they have less people on
> the field, but no-one deemed it a problem, more something that just
> needed to gotten used to.
>
> This one simple system could have a dramatic effect on membership
> progression and retention. The problem is getting it introduced. Anyone
> in the UK who watched "Can Gerry Robinson Fix the NHS?" knows exactly
> what I mean when I say that anyone I talk to tells me "but it's not the
> way we do things". I understand Cambridge had this problem, and
> conviced the large majority people before railroading the remaing
> stubborn few :-).
>
> Let me give an example. Last summer I organised flying on Friday
> evenings. Via e-mail I'd arrange winch drivers and instructors. Then
> I'd let three students come per each instructor, and everyone got to
> fly three times in just three hours (instead of the usual six+).
>
> Then I wrote a webpage (Zoho Creator) which basically did all this for
> me. Every time an instructor signed up, the system allowed three more
> students to book. It even has RSS feeds so students can be alerted as
> soon as more slots are available.
>
> Could I get this introduced? Could I heck! People couldn't grasp that
> it wasn't any different from what I'd been doing manually. Luckily a
> more forward-thinking instructor has "seen the light" and we're working
> on getting it running this summer. My dream is that eventually the
> whole club will use the system for all days...
>
>
> Dan

[Dan G]

Sandy Stevenson wrote:

> So, Dan, any chance we could get a look at your website for scheduling?
> Sounds intriguing.

Sure, it's at http://cavershamweather.org.uk/ffb.html

Play around with it as much as you want. I haven't touched it since the
summer so I hope it still works! The only issues I didn't overcome is
that people can't cancel without going through me, and that old
bookings stay in the system (I'd need to go through the back-end once a
week clearing out old dates).


Dan

[Dan G]

Sandy Stevenson wrote:

> The points made about weather scrambling schedules are right, so we
> plan to rotate each group through the 8 available slots each weekend to
> give each student a fair chance at some soaring flights, and equal
> exposure to the risk of weather delays.

I think there's too many slots in that system (four a day?). Cambridge
have only am/pm slots and I think that's the best way (you can see
their booking page at www.glide.co.uk by going to Member's Area->Two
seater booking. TBH all they're doing is rostering two instructors a
day, then letting four trainees book for am and four pm). I think they
might also keep one two-seater outside the booking system for "turn up
and wait" people, check flights, trial lessons etc.

Regards the post-solo->xc period, one idea I really liked the look of
was from a Canadanian club where small "teams" of a couple of suitable
trainees were formed with an instructor, and were then dedicated a good
GRP glider to use. Each trainee got a flight of up to two(?) hours,
while the trainee(s) who weren't flying "crewed" (in case of landout).
I think they also did ground school on xc theory together. It sounded a
very effective system.


Dan

[Roger Worden]

I'm not familiar with the booking system being mentioned... Our club does do
a "sign up" sheet each training day. Students sign up for a one-hour block,
first-come first-choice. In that hour they can do several patterns or one
(sometimes two) higher flight, but they're not supposed to go over their
hour (much). If they want to go again, they sign up for another block AFTER
everyone else.

Private pilots who want to fly a ship also sign up for an hour block, and
try to pick the hour they want. Again, first arrival gets to pick their
hour. If two pilots want to go together, they can get a two-hour block. If
you're the last signup of the day, the sky's the limit... but if you come
back really late you may have to push back by yourself.

How to ensure there are people around to crew? That doesn't seem to be a
problem. We make it clear to new members that this is a CLUB, not a service.
You're expected to be there as much of the day as you can, and help with one
or more of washing, preflighting, pushing out, pushing in, tying down, and
maintenance (as you are able). Peer pressure keeps this honest. If someone
is warming the bench more than helping out, it's mentioned to them. Your
friends in the club will do anything for you once you've demonstrated you'll
do your share. Soon enough everyone finds out that there's much to be
learned on the ground from other members, so they stick around all day.

As one writer said earlier, not everyone has the drive to make it work for
themselves. There is a LOT to learn both on and off the field.


"Michael Ash" > wrote in message
...
> Sandy Stevenson > wrote:
> > It's interesting to see that this is apparently a world wide problem.
> > The post below could have been written from my club in Canada.
> > My view of it is that we have to improve support for new member-pilots
> > by
> > improving the number of flights per day that they get, and by
> > shortening the
> > solo and licence cycles. We've seen Cambridge's booking system, and
> > started a simplified booking system of our own last season. This year
> > we're trying to
> > improve it by assignng students to an instructor and a two seat
> > aircraft in
> > pairs for 90 minute blocks. When there's no lift, we're hoping this
> > will get each
> > student 2 to 3 flights each during the block.
> > Since we can only fly six months of the year, we're hoping to solo and
> > licence people sooner with this system.
>
> The idea of a booking system seems like a good idea. I don't know if our
> club is big enough for it (3 gliders, 1 tow plane) but often this summer I
> was out at the field getting one flight per day, with my fellow students
> who were also getting one flight per day, thinking that it work just as
> well and be a lot less driving if we came out half as often and got two
> flights per day.
>
> Martin's point about a booking system making for an emptier airfield has
> some merit to it, and I'm not sure how I feel about that. Maybe having
> better instructor/student coordination would be better, but it's hard to
> see how. We can e-mail the instructor ahead of time and ask if he has room
> for another student one day, but there's no good way for two students to
> notice that they're both flying on both Saturday and Sunday and arrange it
> so they each fly one day, but with more flights.
>
> Simply flying more often overall would be good as well, but I'm not sure
> that can be done without obtaining more equipment or people, as our
> gliders/instructors tend to be completely booked all day when a number of
> students are at the field.
>
> > From a previous post on this topic, it appears that there's some
> > circumstance in the UK where trial flights must be introductory lesson
> > flights. We don't necessarily have that as a formal restriction, but
> > obviously we do make the first lesson available to people coming out
> > for a flight. We are able to recognize, however, that some people just
> > want to go up for the sake of saying they've done it. They never intend
> > to learn to fly. We try to look after them as well, since we make
> > money from their flights.
>
> Officially, our club only offers instructional flights, and only to
> members. (This being club rules, not government.) Unofficially, anybody
> can be a temporary member for a month for a reasonable fee, and our
> instructors are happy to accomodate anything from "teach me to fly!" to "I
> just want to get some good pictures". And as you say, we make money from
> it so we like them all.
>
> --
> Michael Ash
> Rogue Amoeba Software