No More Guaranteed Instructor Job?

I began looking at this program a few months ago right before everything went kind of nuts due to Covid-19, and I was considering a start date this summer. This was March 2020. Since then, it seems the ATP website no longer advertises a guaranteed instructor position upon successful completion of the program, presumably due to the pandemic effect on the aviation industry. Its been replaced with something about how you will be highly competitive because you have all your ratings. It seems to me, like those people who already were instructors trying to get to a regional would be the most competitive, not me a fresh graduate. Something like a pile up of instructors comes to mind. There has been a lot of rhetoric about going through with training now anyway as the airline industry will (hopefully) be back on the up swing in the two years it would take a new student to get their 1500. This small change on the website worries me considerably about taking on 80-90k in debt and the not even being able to get an instructor job to start building the hours to get to a regional when the begin hiring again, yet a lone afford to live.

Can anyone speak to this concern?

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Colin,

That is correct, the instructor job is no longer guaranteed.

You are correct, taking on debt for education is a sort of risk, but tell me any other career that offers a guaranteed job. They just are not out there. Any doctor, lawyer, etc takes on higher education with the hope that they will be able to turn it into a career, it is not guaranteed for anybody.

What is a guarantee though is that hard work, determination and qualifications pay off. If you do well, people will see that and you will be well positioned to obtain a job after graduation. I personally would recommend taking a look at the 100 multi hour program as it will give you an edge up on those that do not have as much multi time.

Chris

Colin,

I’m not going to lie, the guaranteed instructor position was a very nice perk (and hopefully when things calm down it will return?). The fact is there are very few schools that offer guaranteed jobs afterwards. If you go to law or medical school there are none. These are exceptional times we’re living in and many facets of our lives are changing.

That all said the reality is we all got very spoiled with the pilot shortage and constant movement in the industry but we went decades when that wasn’t the case. People still did their training, still managed to find jobs building time asked l and still made it to the airlines. Was it tougher? Absolutely but if you’re a good pilot with a clean background you should be fine.

Right now things are tough but I sincerely believe we will recover and those who start training now will find themselves in a good position. If you want to wait till it happens and the guarantees return but that puts ALOT of pilots ahead of you seniority wise. Your call.

Adam

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Does this apply for everyone that’s currently in the system as well or only to those that start after a certain date? When I got admitted and I believe when I started, the guaranteed instructor position was a big selling point for me and I was sort of counting on it to obviously get my hours. I understand that it was still dependent on how I did during the training process, but I do feel that the program loses some value to it’s students if this is taken away.

Seuk,

It’s still guaranteed for anyone who’s paid their deposit or beyond.

Adam

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That’s great to hear. Thank you for the clarification!

In addition, what about the hiring bonuses/tuition reimbursements from airlines? I find it hard to believe they would still honor it, now that basically every airline is cash strapped. Not sure if this is the case, but if it is, part 61 seems like a better route now, if it wasn’t already.

Vince,

I think at this moment that’s probably the furthest thing on their list of priorities.

Adam

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Colin,

Yes, this is a big change, but it shouldn’t stop you from achieving your dreams if this is something that you really want to pursue. As others have mentioned, what other industry guarantees a job?

ATP has been producing pilots of the highest caliber since 1984 and has survived every economic recession since. Just like any business, the program is always subject to change. Temporarily removing the guaranteed instructor position is a necessary change. ATP will still hire instructors, the job just won’t be guaranteed. I see this as a good thing actually. This will ensure that only the best graduates are offered CFI positions. Competition is a good thing. If flight instructing isn’t in the cards for you, I hear the demand for cargo pilots is at an all-time high. That would be my second option. That should also give you some turbine time which is attractive to regional airlines.

One more thing I want to mention is that ATP is now offering their ATP CTP course for free as part of the ACPP syllabus. Having completed this course and passing the ATM written test will make you more marketable for when the regionals start hiring again.

Tory

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Vince,

I have not heard of the hiring bonuses or tuition reimbursement going away. Since the airlines aren’t hiring right now the airlines don’t need to pay them. So, there’s no need to cancel these incentives at this moment.

Even with everything going on, there is still a pilot shortage and there will still be one once the airlines start hiring again since we know how many pilots will be expected to retire. No one knows if the airlines will stop offering hiring bonuses or tuition reimbursement yet. Even if they did, I wouldn’t let that stop you from becoming a pilot. If this is what you REALLY want to do, it shouldn’t matter.

Tory

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Oh absolutely. My mind hasn’t changed on becoming an airline pilot or not. It’s what I’ve always wanted to do and I won’t stop pursuing it until I get there, regardless of this pandemic. The certainties in all this uncertainty are, like you said, that the industry will recover from this, as it always has, and the retiring pilots are still going to create vacancies.

That being said, I’m planning on starting training soon, so this may have an impact on what path/where I choose to go for training.

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Vince,

I’m not following. What does tuition reimbursement or hiring bonuses have to do with where you choose to train? Choosing where to train is an important decision and the quality of training really has nothing to do with tuition reimbursement or bonuses. You also mentioned part 61 vs 141. I don’t see the connection that you were trying to make with that comment either. Can you help me understand your thought process?

Tory

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On top of the fast track training, aren’t tuition reimbursement/bonuses and the guaranteed instructor job part of ATP’s ‘stand-out’ incentives? It seems to me that those factors would play into the decision of choosing where to train, at least based on price. And I know price isn’t the only important factor when choosing where to train, but it nonetheless is a factor.

Regarding part 61 vs 141, I know that, technically, the difference between the two are the FAR requirements, but I was under the impression that part 61 is generally cheaper compared to part 141, among other nuances like structure of training, flexibility, etc. Please correct me if I’m wrong. I was also told that it’s possible to get all the licenses and certifications done at a part 61 just as fast. And obviously I have no experience with the quality of training at ATP, but I have heard from others online that it’s a mixed bag.

I did some research around my local airport and most of the part 61 flight schools have rate estimates of $45,000-$50,000 for PPL to CFI, compared to ATP’s $81,000. And now that the guaranteed flight instructor job is gone, it’s sort of one less reason to do training at ATP.

So this is pretty much my thought process for all of this. Please let me know if anything I mentioned was incorrect!

Vince,

First it sounds like you believe ATP is a Part 141 school which it is not. Beyond that there’s no question the guaranteed instructor position and the Tuition Reimbursement’s were great perks (the status of the latter is still in question). Regardless ATP has been training pilots for the airlines for over 35 yrs and both those perks are fairly recent additions. When I completed the program neither was offered.

What ATP did offer (and still does) is IF you perform very well you will offered a position as they come available. Work hard and there will be opportunities. That’s what I was told and that was my mind set. Becoming a pilot was the single most challenging endeavor I’ve ever done in my life. I busted my butt and in the end ATP offered me an instructor position. There were others I trained with who were not. There were also no flow thru’s, Conditional Offers of Employment, Tuition Reimbursement, etc. What they did have was Letters of Agreement with many Regionals (something no other flight school had) that said if you completed the program and did well ATP grads were able to interview with significant hour reductions. While this is no longer possible it demonstrates the fact the airlines placed tremendous value on the fact that you successfully completed a very rigorous training program and had the confidence you’d be successful in theirs. As I said not everyone I trained with was successful. They blamed ATP and went on to other careers. I’m an airline Capt.

The point is ATP has NEVER been just about the perks. It’s about training pilots for careers at the airlines and they do it exceptional well.

Adam

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Vince,

The bonuses and tuition reimbursement are incentives provided by the airlines. If an airline offers a hiring bonus, every pilot will receive it regardless of where the pilot did their flight training.

Tuition reimbursement is also something that the airline has control over. ATP is one of many schools that has agreements with airlines that offer tuition reimbursement. If an airline decides to stop offering tuition reimbursement, then every school with an agreement with that airline will be affected. So, again, choosing a school has nothing to do with either.

As for your understanding of how part 61 and 141 works, it comes down to the syllabus. A part 61 school uses the FARs written by the FAA. Part 61 schools can tailor the training for each student and sometimes go out of order. Part 141 schools use their own syllabus. The syllabus has to be approved by the FAA. This approach gets scrutinized because the part 141 syllabus is inflexible. It may look cheaper on paper. It may even look faster, but that’s not always the case. Part 141 schools rely on stage checks to progress a student to the next phase of training. Instructor availability, or aircraft availability can slow the process or even bring it to a complete halt until an aircraft is brought back from a maintenance hangar. This doesn’t always happen, but it can, and it does often enough that a lot of pilots complain about how much their 141 school cost or how long it took that they end up switching to a part 61 school like ATP to finish their training.

As for the rates that you’re seeing online. I have a feeling that you’re not comparing apples to apples. You need to look deeper. Don’t just look at the total price. Look at the ratings that the price is based on. Also look at the number of hours for each rating and the total number of hours that a pilot is estimated to have by the end of the program.

A lot of times a school will advertise the cost of their program based on FAA minimums, not national average minimums. Plus, if a school is cheaper than ATP, it’s probably because of two reasons, their equipment is older, and they don’t offer the same ratings as ATP. For example, a lot of schools don’t offer MEI or CFII. Those are typically offered as an additional course. A lot of schools don’t offer 100 hours of multi-engine time either. That would explain the price difference.

Lastly, when it comes to choosing a school, you can’t just look at it from a financial perspective. You’re focusing on total cost, and maximum financial ROI. There’s a lot more that goes into creating a quality school than that. I remember when I was doing my research on flight schools. ATP was the best bang for my buck. They pioneered the airline oriented fast track program. I chose them because they had the reputation to back themselves up.

The mixed bag stories that you’ve heard of are most likely written by the students that weren’t successful. 9.999 times out of 10, those stories were written by students that didn’t take responsibility for their actions or take initiative to ensure their success in the program. We’ve heard every excuse. There’s always more to the story that justifies why a student wasn’t successful and the common denominator always comes down to integrity and initiative.

ATP is not for everyone. But the program will deliver what it promises if you sign up with realistic expectations. It’s not a drive through. Your hand will not be held. It requires a lot of self discipline. There will be one-on-one ground, but it’s primarily self-study. The unsuccessful students almost always miss that crucial point. But if you trust the program, and you take it upon yourself to ensure that you’re maximizing your education, the cost of the program will be invaluable. As a graduate of the program in 2015, I was hired by Horizon in 2017. I upgraded in 2019. I would not have been able to have accomplish that had I gone somewhere else. New hire bonus and tuition reimbursement aside, I would not have done anything different.

Tory

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As a matter of fact, ATP and Horizon didn’t have a tuition reimbursement contract when I signed up. I was the first ATP CFI to accept tuition reimbursement from Horizon. Plus, when I accepted my conditional job offer from Horizon, there was no hiring bonus on the table. That came after as a nice surprise.

Tory

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Thanks @Adam and @Tory for the detailed responses.

So I’m assuming ATP is a Part 61 school. TIL!

In terms of the school I’m looking at, by the end of CFI training, total hours would be 265.

Here’s their documentation:

Vince,

There are many flight schools out there. Some good, some not so much. There’s no multi training, no MEI and no CFII if you’re comparing apples to apples so you’d need to factor that in. More important while there are most certainly “cheaper” options there’s also the saying you get what you pay for. While $50k is certainly less money flight training will never be inexpensive and $50k+ it’s a fair amount of money to gamble with (not to mention your future career).

I’d encourage you to do your research, ask alot of questions and see if they’ve actually had anyone go through their program and make it to the airlines.

Adam

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Like I said, this school doesn’t offer any training in a multi engine aircraft. Nor does it offer MEI or CFII training. ATP’s program would be comparable in price if ATP only offered the same ratings as this school.

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What is someone decided to go the Air Force route and get pilot certifications instead of doing ATP during this time?