1.) If I have like an Associate of Science or maybe even no college degree, would I be able to work for a regional I want to work for, assuming I did well in my training (with the shortage, and of course after the Virus ends)?
2.) This question kinda isn’t aviation-related, but do you think it is wise for students wanting to become a pilot to not take challenging courses (IB, AP, honors) in junior year and senior year of high school in order to work as much as possible to make money to pay for ppl, cc, living cost later in life, etc.
3.) Also, I’m just curious I much seniority a pilot needs to have in order to win the bid to fly planes that do long haul flights to maybe Asia?
First, there is no “like” an associates degree. You either have one or you don’t (I know you didn’t come here from a English lesson but if you want to be a professional, you need to communicate like one). To answer your question the Regionals require no college. However the Majors want one and when your Regional buddies all start getting hired and making 2x what you’re making in their first year you’ll be sorry you don’t have one.
Personally I never think it’s wise to not seek to excel. In fact if you truly want to be successful as a pilot you cannot be afraid of hard work. Pilot training will make your AP and honors classes seem easy.
Impossible to answer as there’s too many variables. Depends on the airline, the fleet, bases, and timing. To give you an example I fly for Hawaiian. When I was hired the A330 was relatively new and was the highest paying plane in our fleet (it also flies worldwide). It initially went very senior and I wasn’t able to get near it for almost 4yrs. Once the luster wore off and we had added a few more newhires were put on it day one. At other airlines it could take more or less time.
The regionals generally do not require a degree of any sort, but of course having one certainly does not hurt and helps you to look even better in your potential employer’s eyes.
I think that taking advanced classes is a great way to save money as most colleges will give credit for AP and IB classes (assuming you score well on the exams). Being able to get credit for certain college classes would be a huge cost savings to you. By the way, I have an IB Diploma myself.
Alot. Widebody positions are generally some of the more senior positions at an airline, especially captain positions. You would need many years of seniority.
Thanks Adam and Chris for answering my questions really good. By the way, I also did sign up for IB, but I’m thinking about not doing it because I feel like I’ll be stressed out if I work at the same time. However, I do agree with Adam that it’s wise to seek for excellence.
Peter, if your highschool offers it, do running start hands down the best choice! If you haven’t heard of it, basically it’s where your junior and senior year you would be going to community college! If you did it full time for both years you would graduate highschool With your hs degree and your AA. In my opinion from talking to my friends that did IB, they thought IB was hell for the most part with very little time for working. When I did running start my senior year, I was also working 25-30 hours and had planned my college schedule each quarter to basically be 7:30 am to 10:30am. Then you would only have 2 years at a university which could get you to flying just that much faster
Well, unfortunately, I don’t think my school has the running start, but we have dual enrollment courses for a cc and 2 other universities, so I’ll consider taking as much dual enrollment courses I can possibly take with other AP classes and hopefully that will leave me with 30 more credits to get an AA.