Student Drop-Out Rates...why?

In another thread, we have been hashing out whether some pilots in training
quit flying because of a hair-raising event, such as a brush with disaster,
or getting lost.

Few ex-students seem to admit that this was a reason for quitting, but the
drop-out rate seems to be far higher than it should be, and we all need to
do our level best to get more people into flight training. The World War II
and Korean War era pilots are dropping like flies, and formerly bustling
airports, especially in the vast reaches of the MidWest and Western states,
are turning into ghost fields.

We need more pilots, pronto, or we won't have anywhere to land in 20 years!
No municipality is going to pay to keep an airport open that is used by
fewer and fewer pilots every year -- and I can't blame them.

Off the top of my head I can think of three reasons (other than being scared
out of the cockpit) for the continuing drop-out conundrum:

1. CFI shuffling - You just get comfortable with an instructor, and off to
the regionals they go, leaving you to start all over with a new CFI...
2. Airport "snobbery" -- You walk into an FBO, prepared to spend thousands,
and you feel like an alien being on a strange world.
3. No Syllabus -- Too many CFIs work off the seat of their pants, without a
formal lesson plan. This drove me nuts, when I was getting my ticket.

You'll notice I've not mentioned the Number One reason people mention for
quitting: Money. We've beaten the relative cost of flying to death, and (for
the purposes of this thread) I will just leave it at this: Learning to fly
is about as expensive as a semester of college, and less expensive than
buying a Harley-Davidson motorcycle. Let's leave "cost" out of this, for
now, as I think it's safe to say that there a millions of Americans who
could easily afford to learn to fly, if the urge were to strike.

That aside, can you name some other reasons for the abysmal drop-out rate of
student pilots? What can we do to make flying more accessible to those
who dream of piloting an aircraft?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
In another thread, we have been hashing out whether some pilots in training
quit flying because of a hair-raising event, such as a brush with disaster,
or getting lost.



Add job and family pressures that that list. I pretty much had to quit
flying back in 1986 due to a horrendous work/school schedule that
lasted for years. I finally got to where I could afford the time again
and the company set me up for a job transfer that kept me going in a
holding pattern for over a year.

Got married in 1997 and the wife wants us to be able to fly, but
combining taking care of her disability needs, corralling our 4 year
old, working up to 100 hour work weeks and lastly trying to get our
final aircraft project home, has put time way up on the rareity scale.
Fortunately when the last aircraft gets home, the need to work as much
overtime goes away and the luxury of a few free hours a week returns.

That aside, can you name some other reasons for the abysmal drop-out rate of
student pilots? What can we do to make flying more accessible to those
who dream of piloting an aircraft?

I'll think about it later on, but for now, ask the same question of any
other activity. For example, ham radio, motorcycling, boating, fishing,
hiking, parachuting, community theater, choir...

Granted, flying has a larger PE barrier than most, but there will
probably be a common thread. You can't do everything, and choices have
to be made.

Time is a big factor. This involves sheer quantity of time, and the
necessity for committing significant chunks of time in a world that
makes it difficult. Some activities require time from others as well.
Boating, for example, has a siginificant time impact on the rest of the
family (whether they come or not).

Jose
--
Quantum Mechanics is like this: God =does= play dice with the universe,
except there's no God, and there's no dice. And maybe there's no universe.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Well I have had a few close calls that required some manuevering,
however the love of aviation is just so strong for me, it will never go
away.

I let my certificate lapse in the winter due to money constraints, but
flying will always be a part of my life.

I may never own my own plane and be destined to be a life long renter,
but at least I will be flying.

I've heard anecdotaly there are a disproportionate number of dropouts
immediately after soloing, and the suspicion is that for some, the main
goal to conquer is flying alone. Once they do that, they feel 'done',
even if it means that they never fly again, or don't ever get their
ticket.

Ben Hallert
PP-ASEL

I don't have any evidence to support this, but I bet there is some
disillusionment involved for many dropouts. They may have been prepared for
the cost, and the learning curve, but for any number of reasons, flying just
isn't what they thought it would be.

In our world today we have enough rules and regulations just in everyday
living to push borderline people over the edge. The amount of responsability,
liability and vulnerability we feel in just driving to work today is daunting.
To complete a pilot certificate and maintain it, one has to volontarily dish
oneself a heaping portion of extra rules, regulations and responsibilities.
For one who imagined flying to be a "free as a bird" sensation, this may be a
hard reality check.

Others, who may have imagined it would be "practical" to use private aviation
in personal or business transportation have to face the fact that there are
few cases where this is realistic. Airplane manufacturers have always used the
argument of how much time you'll save, whilst enjoying the experience and
spending little more than the cost of other transportation, but with the state
of roads and low cost air transportation today there are few cases where this
argument is valid.

People fly for many different reasons - and people take up flying with as many
hopes and expectations. I'll bet more than e few students, after 20 sweaty
hours in a C-152 begin to realize how many years and dollars separate them
from the publicity image of the guy in designer suits climbing leisurely into
his private KingAir at the end of a business day for the relaxing flight home,
and they decide it isn't worth it.

G Faris

Asude the above comment about disillusionment, I would be willing to bet that
wife/girlfriend problems are very high on the list. Of course, it doesn't have
to be the guy who wants it and the girl who is opposed - but it's often that
way. What the guy sees as challenging, enjoyable and possibly useful, the girl
sees as costly, useless and possibly dangerous.

Greg

Ben Hallert wrote:
I've heard anecdotaly there are a disproportionate number of dropouts
immediately after soloing, and the suspicion is that for some, the main
goal to conquer is flying alone. Once they do that, they feel 'done',
even if it means that they never fly again, or don't ever get their
ticket.

I place the blame squarely upon that one Andy Griffith Show episode.

On Fri, 19 Aug 2005 03:48:39 GMT, "Jay Honeck"
wrote in
rEcNe.42126$084.40784@attbi_s22::

That aside, can you name some other reasons for the abysmal drop-out rate of
student pilots?

They realize they are not qualified to pilot an aircraft in the NAS
due to their inability to meet the demands to do so safely,
competently and without stressful fear of disaster.

What can we do to make flying more accessible to those
who dream of piloting an aircraft?

Those in the category I mentioned above would need a brain transplant.
:-)

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:rEcNe.42126$084.40784@attbi_s22...

snip

That aside, can you name some other reasons for the abysmal drop-out rate
of student pilots? What can we do to make flying more accessible to
those who dream of piloting an aircraft?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"


Even to people who grew up in the 50's and 60's had pilots as heroes. The
guys at Edwards, the Astronauts, etc. Before then, the WWII generation of
pilots had a laundry list of aviation heroes. This brought people into
flying. In today's society, there are no pilot-heroes, and flying isn't
generally regarded as glamorous or as a grand adventure.

It has already been mentioned, but there are too many FBO's that don't care.
You sign up for an airplane and instructor for Saturday morning, only to
arrive and either the instructor has taken a charter flight elsewhere or the
airplane is broken. Even better, nobody bothered to call you, so you've
wasted a trip. Beyond that, the person behind the desk at the FBO doesn't
apologize.

There are some great FBO's out there, but there are a lot of not-so-good
ones too. The smart ones realize that without pilots, they are out of
business. The dumb ones jack up the cost of getting a PPL to the point
where there are no new pilots. In 20 years, they will wonder what happened
to all of their business and why they are closing the doors. The FBO at my
airfield is one of those. They sold their C-152's, so there is no
inexpensive airplane rental option for training. Also, they doubled their
instructor cost (not pay). The effect of these two items has more or less
doubled the cost of getting a PPL through that FBO. In the old days, they
used to crank out quite a few new pilots. I'm not aware of a single person
who completed their PPL using the services of this FBO in the last 2-3
years.

Aviation is getting old. I'm 40 now, and for 12 years have been the
youngest person hanging out at airport and the youngest person in my EAA
chapter. When a new guy shows up who's 28, he sees all the old farts (maybe
I'm one too in his eyes), and looks for a younger crowd to hang with. This
doesn't help.

KB