"Icebound" wrote:
Of course I had to pay him to get into the airplane, but when he got out an
hour and a half later, he shook my hand, signed the back of my Student
Permit, took some trophy pictures for me, and officially stated that the
Government was satisfied that I can pilot an airplane.

Congratulations!!

Based on my experience:
Never choose a big multi-instructor school because it is close. Wrong
reason. It is remarkable how much time is eaten up ferrying back and forth
to the practice area. Driving five times the distance saved at least 20
minutes per flight equals about 70 dollars dual all taxes in. I don't think
it cost me 10 bucks in gas to go the extra distance. Just the 50 or 60
bucks saved per hour of real instruction would have cut five or six grand
right there.

On the other hand, the "right" instructor can make *all* the difference.
The extra 20 minutes to and from the practice area would have been well
worth it had you been flying with the instructor you finished-up with in
the first place, right?

Stay away from schools with computerized instructor booking. Sounds good.
I can schedule my instructor for a month in advance. So can the next guy.
If my dates run into bad weather I have no flexibility to book another day
because he is already booked. It can work in your favour, but it can also
backfire severely, especially in Winter.

I worked at a school with online scheduling.
On occasion, schedules for airplanes or instructors had to be adjusted
to accommodate maintenance, weather, or the needs of another customer --
most customers are understanding of this occasional occurrence because
they know when it's their turn, their needs will be addressed in the
same manner. For the most part, it works very well. You can schedule an
airplane/instructor during hours when the office isn't open, without
having to talk with anyone. If your first choice (airplane and/or
instructor) isn't available, you can readily see what/who *is*
available. And **IF** the person keeping the system up to date is on the
ball, all your flight/currency info is readily available, and if you try
to schedule an airplane when your currency has run out or you don't meet
the qualifications for a particular aircraft, the program will not
accept the attempted scheduling and will prompt you to call the office.

I ran past the school's solo-currency requirements a
number of times resulting in more instructor time than
should have been necessary.

Online scheduling *does* force the customer to be more diligent about
his/her own needs re currency and the aircraft/instructor. Flight
training is generally ongoing, a conscientious instructor will
thoroughly explain currency requirements, and he/she will be involved
while you are soloing so that you stay on the schedule and don't
disappear during your currency; however, it is ultimately your
responsibility to stay on the schedule to keep your currency up. The
airplane you fly may not always be available on short notice when you
realize your currency is about to expire, but that can be the case with
manual scheduling as well, if you wait till the last minute to
schedule--that's not the fault of online scheduling.

The toughest thing, however, is to spot the passenger
who is posing as an instructor. I actually thought that
my instructor was "pretty good".... until I took my first
ride with the new one.

That *is* tough, and hard to know unless you fly with someone different
on occasion. That's one of the advantages of some multi-instructor
schools with structured, spelled-out curriculum, such as a CPC. If your
usual instructor is not available, any other instructor can look at your
records and logbook, see what you are working on, and pick up with no
overlap. Stage checks are also done by a other instructors, giving the
customer the opportunity to fly with someone else.

And nothing substitutes ongoing communication between customer and
instructor -- if you feel you could be progressing more rapidly, that
you and your instructor don't readily "connect", or that your instructor
is not mindful of your time in the airplane or using your $$ wisely, you
need to be pro-active about it. That's not always easy to do without
feeling like you're stepping on toes, but like anything else, the level
of service you get depends on your input/feedback and sense of your own
progress.

Didn't mean this to sound like a lecture, but online scheduling and
multi-instructor schools can be advantageous and don't necessarily all
deserve a bad rap.

Congrats again ... have fun, fly safe.