Training Foreign Students?

Jeanie

Jeanie

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Jeanie
Are the TSA requirements/ hoops to register and be able to train foreign students as horrific as they appear on the web site?

I have a woman who is not a US Citizen who wants to learn to fly and I just looked at the TSA website regarding this - It's rather involved at first glance!
 
Jeanie said:
Are the TSA requirements/ hoops to register and be able to train foreign students as horrific as they appear on the web site?

I have a woman who is not a US Citizen who wants to learn to fly and I just looked at the TSA website regarding this - It's rather involved at first glance!
Click to expand...

I can tell you from the student side (Canadian citizen), it's a pain-in-the-backside, but not really that severe.

First off, the CFI needs to register on the TSA website. Then the student submits a training request, naming the CFI or flight school. The CFI/School then validates that the student will be training with them for the specified rating. Then the student pays TSA. TSA then requests fingerprints. Student goes to local PD and has fingerprints done and sent to TSA (note here, student may not touch the fingerprints after taken, the PD must send them in). When TSA receives prints, they issue an e-mail to student and CFI/school saying they have permission to begin training.

At that point, the clock is ticking. Training must commence within 6 months, and permission ends in 1 year (not from start of training, but from when permission is received). If you blow past the one year, the steps are the same, except no fingerprints are required.

Remember this is for specific training events:
1) Initial license: either Recreational, Sport, or Private
2) Instrument
3) ME

It is not for commercial, flight reviews, or any of those things. If the student finishes their Sport and decides to move on the Private, that should not trigger another AFSP application.

Good overview here:
http://www.aopa.org/tsa_rule/
 
Jeanie said:
Are the TSA requirements/ hoops to register and be able to train foreign students as horrific as they appear on the web site?

I have a woman who is not a US Citizen who wants to learn to fly and I just looked at the TSA website regarding this - It's rather involved at first glance!
Click to expand...

It is not nearly as hard as it looks like at first glance. I managed to get my 82 year old computer illiterate CFI to sign up at the time (the local TSA head honcho came over to do the paperwork for him, may have been a factor).

If you can buy tickets at ticketmaster you are going to figure out the flightstudents.gov site yourself. Call the 1-800 number, they give you the link for the CFI signup. Sign up a s 'flightschool' that way another instructor can do a lesson or two on your behalf, if you sign up as CFI the students approval is tied to you personally.
 
Hi WEilke,

But if I sign up as "flight school" then doesn't that mean that I have to be a part 141 school? Which I'm not - I'm just little ol' me.....

Thanks for the info you guys... Sheesh, I just don't see this woman as a threat but well, a hoop jumping we will go........
 
Jeanie said:
But if I sign up as "flight school" then doesn't that mean that I have to be a part 141 school? Which I'm not - I'm just little me........
Click to expand...
No, under the TSA regs (49 CFR Part 1552, now part of the standard FAR/AIM's) every individual CFI is a "flight school."
 
Jeanie said:
Hi WEilke,

But if I sign up as "flight school" then doesn't that mean that I have to be a part 141 school? Which I'm not - I'm just little ol' me.....

Thanks for the info you guys... Sheesh, I just don't see this woman as a threat but well, a hoop jumping we will go........
Click to expand...

You are working at the interface of three federal agencies: DHS, DOT and DOS. They all use different definitions and don't talk to each other. So no, you don't need to be part 141. You do have to keep a file on the student, take a picture (eg with your cellphone) and submit it at the start of training.

Btw, unless this has changed, the students fingerprints are not at the local PD but rather at a facility part of the 'TSA fingerprint clearinghouse'. Most of those are the ops departments of larger airports, the same folks that issue SIDA cards. Usually requires an appointment and often a bit of travel.
 
Jeanie said:
Hi WEilke,

But if I sign up as "flight school" then doesn't that mean that I have to be a part 141 school? Which I'm not - I'm just little ol' me.....

Thanks for the info you guys... Sheesh, I just don't see this woman as a threat but well, a hoop jumping we will go........
Click to expand...

You are working at the interface of three federal agencies: DHS, DOT and DOS. They all use different definitions and don't talk to each other. So no, you don't need to be part 141. You do have to keep a file on the student, take a picture (eg with your cellphone) and submit it at the start of training.

Btw, unless this has changed, the students fingerprints are not at the local PD but rather at a facility part of the 'TSA fingerprint clearinghouse'. Most of those are the ops departments of larger airports, the same folks that issue SIDA cards. Usually requires an appointment and often a bit of travel.
 
Jeanie said:
Are the TSA requirements/ hoops to register and be able to train foreign students as horrific as they appear on the web site?

I have a woman who is not a US Citizen who wants to learn to fly and I just looked at the TSA website regarding this - It's rather involved at first glance!
Click to expand...
No, it's really not difficult. Although it certainly can be very difficult to impossible since the TSA in this regard is completely irrational.

Let me guide you though what a hypothetical friend of mine had to go through. First he signed up online - that was ok. Then the TSA sent him an email with an attached letter. That email instructed him to take the letter and present it to the local police station for fingerprinting. The letter, in turn, instructed the police department to take the fingerprints and to mail them directly to the TSA - under no circumstances was the applicant to take possession of the fingerprints. This is according to a letter which the applicant was suppose to present to the police - no way he could have altered it before presenting it to the police! :idea:

Anyways, of course the police read the letter and said "we've never heard of that. We don't mail things and pay for postage for you". They were happy to take the fingerprints, though. So the next day, the applicant went back to the same police station without showing them the letter! Imagine that! Then they took his fingerprints and gave him the prints. He then mailed them to the TSA himself. This worked fine, but to this day I don't understand what the point of this is. Wouldn't a bad guy just mail someone else's fingerprints?

Anyways, there you go. Just shake your head in disbelief and move on.

-Felix
 
And how on earth would an instructor know any different if a non-citizen presented the instructor with a fake ID and passport. Just how is an instructor supposed to really know? I do all the TSA stuff, but find it to be a big joke if it's really supposed to provide security.

Ryan
 
Maybe the bad guys all have their fingerprints already logged into Interpol and that's how they would know............ yeah sure....

Anyway, we'll see how it goes - I now have an account w/ them and wonder when some guy in a brown shirt will show up to go through my records....
 
sba55 said:
Anyways, of course the police read the letter and said "we've never heard of that. We don't mail things and pay for postage for you". They were happy to take the fingerprints, though.
Click to expand...

That seems kind of odd that they didn't know what to do. I have taken a couple of background checks, the instructions to mail directly from the law enforcement agency are standard procedure. Of course, you have to provide a stamped envelope with the address of the agency that receives the prints , but the printing agency puts their address stamp as sender and puts their seal accross the envelope flap.
 
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weilke said:
That seems kind of odd that they didn't know what to do. I have taken a couple of background checks, the instructions to mail directly from the law enforcement agency are standard procedure. Of course, you have to provide a stamped envelope with the address of the agency that receives the prints , but the printing agency puts their address stamp as sender and puts their seal accross the envelope flap.
Click to expand...
Yeah. I suspect it was more a general hatred of the feds.

Anyways, those instructions are SOP even for non-TSA related stuff? Do the idiots who create those procedures realize that one can either alter or not present the letter? Do they have a HS education? Unbelievable.
 
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