What does it look like from the CFI's perspective

C

climber74

Filing Flight Plan
Joined
Jun 9, 2022
Messages
2
Display Name
Display name:
climber74
Hello:

I've been lurking on this board since I started training for a private certification but this is my first post. There are more than enough threads that start with a frustrated student. I don't want to start another.

Instead, I'm hoping to hear from the CFI's. I'm sure working as a CFI can be stressful, terrifying, even soul crushing and not particularly lucrative. I'm sure it can be hard for a twenty-something to teach fourty-, fifty-, sixty-something students who have likely been successful in many other parts of their lives and have the ego to show for it.

In an effort to temper my frustration and give me some empathy and perspective, I'd like to understand what things look like from the right seat. I know that CFI's come in all different forms so I'll narrow it to aspirant ATP CFI's that are working for a part 61 school. What are their incentives and obstacles? What do their economics look like? What kinds of things follow them from their time as a CFI at a flight school to an ATP job application?

Thanks for any insight you can provide.
 
Loved, loved, loved it at the time, but those were much simpler times.
Today??? Would not touch a CFI job with a million foot pole.
 
I do understand the need for time if you want to be an airline pilot. In those cases I would go th pilot mill route. You have a path, plus some protection.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 5QK
I instructed some 20 years ago, really enjoyed it 97% of the time. Squeezing into a plane with someone who has bad BO, doesn't listen, gets motion sick, rude, grumpy, or is late for appointments is the bad. I found the younger, and less hours they had, the better they were as a student.
Check rides with old people, or recurrent training with someone who had about 1,000 to 5,000 hours, was usually brutal, and they were not only terrible pilots, but didn't listen.
 
climber74 said:
I know that CFI's come in all different forms so I'll narrow it to aspirant ATP CFI's that are working for a part 61 school.
Click to expand...
So, uh, I don't fit this category... because I'm not really headed for the airlines, but having seen those types, I'd strongly argue that you need to do the whole "take one day at a time" thing, and chose to focus on the job at hand even if you have a bigger goal down the road. Usually, students can smell someone that isn't really there for them, and it's not the best thing.
 
Whitney said:
I instructed some 20 years ago, really enjoyed it 97% of the time. Squeezing into a plane with someone who has bad BO, doesn't listen, gets motion sick, rude, grumpy, or is late for appointments is the bad. I found the younger, and less hours they had, the better they were as a student.
Check rides with old people, or recurrent training with someone who had about 1,000 to 5,000 hours, was usually brutal, and they were not only terrible pilots, but didn't listen.
Click to expand...

Quote possibly the 5000 hour Pilot had something to add, and you didn’t listen?
Just sayin.

i have somewhere around 25,000 hours, but I respect the fact that my 3,000 hour First Officers have seen something I have not.
 
The funny thing is that in the tailwheel world. I often find the older pilots enjoyable, and there's nearly always something about life or business to learn from a guy that has the time and money to buy a taildragger.
 
Whitney said:
I instructed some 20 years ago, really enjoyed it 97% of the time. Squeezing into a plane with someone who has bad BO, doesn't listen, gets motion sick, rude, grumpy, or is late for appointments is the bad. I found the younger, and less hours they had, the better they were as a student.
Check rides with old people, or recurrent training with someone who had about 1,000 to 5,000 hours, was usually brutal, and they were not only terrible pilots, but didn't listen.
Click to expand...

I was lucky. No of the issues state.

The closest I came to getting killed by a student was a 24,000 (yes 24 THOUSAND) hour 747 Captain in a C-150. He wanted to fly to some meeting, but didn't have time for a checkout, so he just paid for me to go along. Dusk takeoff, he jams the throttle and applies NO rudder. And we head for the trees. I wasn't as alert as I should have been (heck he had 24,000 hours), but quickly got in a boot full of rudder as we went off into the grass.

The best thing about instructing is that YOU learn a lot about flying. Because as you fly with more students, you get to see more ways to screw up just about everything in flying. There is just no way for one person to experience all the mistakes on their own. :D
 
I'm definitely not in the target demographic but I had one of those great experiences we have from time to time. Rusty pilot returning to flying after a long hiatus. New to him airplane make and model, including glass One prior lesson - basic "four fundamentals" - about a month earlier.

Maneuvers including slow flight and stalls pretty good. Then came the first landing attempts. Way off on the first, go around. Looked good in final on the second attempt but went bad in the flare, go around. (Both go around we're initiated by the pilot.) Third attempt (with only two verbal prompts from me, absolute perfection. Touchdown like a feather, exactly in centerline.

I applauded and still have a smile two days later!
 
Pinecone said:
The best thing about instructing is that YOU learn a lot about flying. Because as you fly with more students, you get to see more ways to screw up just about everything in flying. There is just no way for one person to experience all the mistakes on their own. :D
Click to expand...

That is exactly how I felt my first 100 hours of dual given. I learned all new ways to try to kill myself or crash an airplane. Ways I was just not creative enough to come up with on my own.
 
At first I thought, this student simply needs to change instructors. Then I thought, this CFI is trying to figure out if their frustrations are any different than other CFIs. But after reading this,

What kinds of things follow them from their time as a CFI at a flight school to an ATP job application?
Click to expand...

I am puzzled. What has happened to create this concern? And yes, I’m a CFI.
 
climber74 said:
What do their economics look like?
Click to expand...
It was long ago, but I can remember showing my pay stub for the prior week to another CFI here in the snow belt of Ohio for $3.50. We were having a beer at the airport restaurant and I was down to my last ten bucks with upcoming bills to pay.
"What are you going to do," he asked me.
"I don't know," I said. "I can't wait to spend it so I can find out."
 
All I can say about the financial side of instructing, is you may not starve to death, but filet mignon will not be a regular part of your diet.
I was a part time instructor, my main jobs as a charter pilot, and truck driver paid the mortgage and other big expenses.
 
I loved the 1065 hrs of instructing I’ve done. Make sure the boss/employee culture is good, and make sure the planes are well maintained. If they are cutting corners or strong arming employees, go somewhere else. Of course, they won’t mention that in the interview…talk with some of the CFIs directly.

My situation was excellent at BVFS KCLL. I’m now flying Citations full time.
 
Clip4 said:
All low time CFIs lack experience. That doesn’t mean they have to lack knowledge.
Click to expand...

I know that when I was a low time CFI I was allot sharper on the regs pertaining to acquiring certificates than I am now as a 60 year old corporate pilot. In the last 20 years I have had a few people ask me if I would instruct them toward their Private and I always declined saying a young full time CFI knows the best way to get you in position to pass the tests. Once they past the test I will go flying with them to show them how things work in the real world and how, hopefully, not get in an accident or trouble with the FAA.

I also still check out some fresh Multi COMM, IFR pilots as SIC's our C560 and they will fly with us for a few months until they find a better job, we do not fly much, not a time builder job. We started this about 6 years ago and it makes me feel good that one the early ones is now flying for a major airline another is flying captain on 757/767's freight and another is the chief pilot for a charter company flying Citation 750/650's. I gave all three of them their first jet time. There were a few that would not study, I am not going to hold their hand and make them, that I dropped.

I had one young woman back when I was a young CFI that was just not getting it. One day she called me a male chauvinist and quit, that bothered me for years because I did not consider myself so. Then 30 years later I had another female student, from the same time period, send me a picture of her in front of the cub and said she had a great time. I got tired of teaching basic students one day when I had a full schedule and all of them were practicing take off and landings. Not counting the C560 instructing time I have about 600 hours instructing.

img028.jpg
 
Love instructing. Hated the responsibility, fly with someone they kill it, no questions about their flying ability. Checkride 400 ft short from the 1000ft marks on a short field after nailing everyone for the last 10 hrs.... Or they were great at hand calculating diversions they are a navy nfo so i had no qualms about their knowledge checkride comes they bust cause they got a new plotter that had a WAC side they knew it wasnt correct but couldnt figure out why. Or my best student did a great checkride failed cause he didnt do a clearing turn before pwr off stalls. DPE was a stickler for clearing turns and i told him that 1000 times. I dont like teaching primary stuff except landings cause thats easiest. Also hated teaching about half the older folks cause they felt we were milking them. One guy went around twice crossing the threshold about 400ft high lap 3 he was gonna do the same before i pulled his power to idle as he turned base. Dude lectured me for being a time builder cfi cause i wouldnt sign him off to solo xc after that flight.

If i could pick my students and drop them at will no questions asked I'd probably enjoy it alot more.
 
I loved instructing back in the day, I still have a student or two per year and do a handful of endorsements and BFRs

If you are talking aspiring regional pilot CFIs, many have a scan where the primary instrument is the Hobbs, supporting, their cellphone.

Find the niche schools with us old CFIs much better place to train and work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top