Find THE BEST Flight School | The ULTIMATE GUIDE

so you've made the decision to become a pilot that is awesome we're going to assume that you've decided that learning privately isn't for you and you want to join a flight school for some more structured education time frames instructors and aircraft availability all great perks by the way but there are a lot of factors you need to look at before signing up for one and trust me when i say it shouldn't be something that's taken lightly it's a big financially impactful decision and you need to be prepared educated and know exactly what you're getting into real quick this is going to be a lot of talking head i don't have a lot of b-roll of flight schools but i'll do what i can to throw in some flying footage here and there all right let's dig in we're going to break things down into a few steps but let's cover some things you need to know before you get started on your searching first why do you want to be a pilot recreation or career it seems silly but knowing the why helps you know what type of school you should go to because flight schools operate with special instructing roles which are called parts there's two of them numbered 61 and 141 here's a quick explanation of what their differences are part 61 flight schools typically offered structured but relaxed approach to getting your certificates and ratings they're flexible too working around your busy schedule part 141 flight schools have heavily structured curriculum that's approved by the faa but it comes with perks like lower hour requirements for certificates and ratings it's not flexible though and usually requires full-time commitment how i look at them is if you want to be a recreational pilot need a single certificate or rating or want flexibility part 61 is a good route part 141 is typically geared more towards career pilots and has a similar feel to attending college but both parks can get you a private pilot license or take you all the way to working in the airlines almost all flight schools offer part 61 training and some offer both 61 and 141 so you can choose which style suits your needs outside that they teach the same things have the same tests and you have to take the same check ride now our second need to know is cost learning to fly is going to cost a good chunk of change and your flight school decisions should never ever be on costs alone we're going to touch on cost a few times in each section because it's such a big deal spending smart can get you the most out of your money keep you from getting taken advantage of and stay out of excessive amounts of debt last we're going to assume that you're looking at flight schools in your local area but realize some of you may be looking at one across the nation or even around the world our suggestions still apply but you may have to skip a visit or discovery flight alright with these out of the way let's get started on our actual first step looking for schools you may know a school at your local airport but it may not be the best school for you because there's a lot to consider if you want to succeed things like how far away is the airport well traveling to and from the airport make it hard for you to attend training how busy is the airport busy airports can sometimes be frustrating like when you have to wait forever to take off or unable to do touch and goes because there's too many planes in the pattern is it in the middle of a city you may have to travel to and from practice areas which can eat up training time airports closer to where you practice is a huge perk what's the weather like this one is often overlooked but weather and fog can cancel your flight so areas with mild weather and blue skies is ideal but also think about seasonal weather for when you want to train now there's a flip side to some of these reasons like traveling to the right airport or school for quality training can make a huge difference busy airports can teach you how to manage traffic patterns and their radios and school with wind or flyable weather can teach you how to land better in crosswinds and be great for instrument training all i'm saying is is that there's positives and negatives to both sides but these aren't the only things you should be thinking about after this video you should have a better idea of what to look for so let's hit the google and search for flight schools making a list of the ones you think could work but be careful this is where things can start to get tricky realize that flight schools are a business they operate for profit meaning they want your money take what you see with a grain of salt some schools may have fancy websites and incredible marketing campaigns that make them seem like they're the only school that you should consider some even advertise the cheapest least expensive or lowest rates in town just trust me ignore all of these because they're typically not what they seem check out what you can about the school and take notes on the positive and negatives that you find for each one make sure to check online reviews too or ask around in a few pilot groups on facebook or other places but be prepared for a barrage of responses and varying opinions for every success story you're going to hear a horror story so thoughtfully listen to what people have to say and take any notes from trends that concern you oh and don't be that guy that joins a group and asks what flight school should i join everyone will hate you do your homework ask about specific schools okay with your research done it's time to move on to our next step visiting schools after your search you should have a list of schools that you'd like to visit or talk to and this part's actually going to be a lot of fun and possibly overwhelming at the same time fun because flying in airplanes but overwhelming because there's a lot that you're going to have to take in plus you're going to have to ask a lot of questions and talk to a few people to get a good feel for the school so let's start with a few things to be aware of when touring schools again they're a business and they want your money and i know we just said this a minute ago but be careful of marketing tactics you're checking out the school not how good their marketing is next not all flight schools have dedicated facilities some operate out of fbos or airport offices also continue to ignore the costs which we'll talk about during the interview section but bring a notepad and write things down you're going to forget almost everything i promise and last take pictures it'll help later on now now on to the visit your vids is probably going to include a tour of the facility a quick look at some of their aircraft sit and chat about the school and your goals and then you're going to talk money so here's what you should do in each of those activities on your tour make sure you're looking at the facility is it clean well maintained and welcoming operations that take pride in their work keep their location ready and inviting at all times the aircraft should be in good condition too notice i didn't say excellent condition training aircraft go through a lot and are far from perfect but what you're looking for is a nice clean airframe good tires decent paint and a minimal amount of dings and dents inside it may be worn but the interior should be clean and complete the gauges should be easy to read have fully functioning avionics and everything properly labeled and it's not uncommon to see an in-op sticker on non-flight essential items flight schools usually have several of the same airplanes so you can move between them if you can take a look at a few of them to make sure they're not just showing you their best and newest airplane consistency in aircraft condition actually says a lot about how a school maintains their aircraft now stay away from schools with poorly maintained aircraft and you'll know it when you see it you're putting your life in the hands of this thing and if you don't feel comfortable when you're looking at it you're not going to feel comfortable when you're flying it once you're done with the tour and checking out aircraft you're probably going to end up in the office to talk more about the school your goals and to ask any questions you may have and straight up this is probably the most important part of the visit and you still have to be careful about those marketing tactics it's easy to let excitement get in the way of reasonable decision making so don't sign up for anything just yet now this conversation is where you're going to learn the most about the flight school and it's your job to really dig in and ask the right questions so you can make the best decision for you and we're not talking about surface level questions we're talking about real questions like these what are your average pass rates for stage checks exams and check rides these questions will tell you how well their instructors prepare the students what's the average training hours to get a private pilot certificate instrument rating commercial pilot certificate and how long does that usually take this tells you how quickly their students get through their training both in flight hours and physical time just realize that part 141 schools can technically get your private pilot certificate in less flight hours than part 61 but in most cases both parts hit the same average flight hours for certificates and ratings well i have the same instructor throughout training when students move between instructors it can take more time to finish training because you have to be redoing flights and lessons to show the new instructor where you're at most of the time you'll have the same instructor through a single certificate or rating unless they move on to something else or you request a new one are your instructors career instructors or on the way to other things this is a follow-up question to the last one and helps answer it too in my opinion guys that stick around and train truly enjoy it and maybe some of the best people to work with guys on the where the airlines usually are only there to build hours and then get out but some of them can be excellent too what's the student-to-instructor ratio you're really asking what an instructor's workload is like so you can get an idea if your instructor even has time for you it's not uncommon to have four to eight students per instructor how many planes do you have this is another good one if there are too many students and not enough aircraft you may have problems scheduling flights these next couple questions are going to be a little more in depth but ask how the school operates and we're talking about class schedules structure homework flight times average flight hours per lesson and the hours they operate this gives you a good idea if they can accommodate your schedule and how much time you need to be able to dedicate to it realize that one hour flight can sometimes take three between a briefing pre-flight taxi takeoff flight landing taxing again securing and a debrief and with that in mind make sure that flight lessons make the best use of your time a good example is if you're doing a one hour lesson and staying at the airport for touch and go's you'll get an hour's worth of actual training but if you have to travel to a practice area say 15 minutes away your one hour can actually turn into 30 minutes of actual training in this case a lesson in the practice area should probably be a two-hour lesson also ask about the airport things like how busy it is what are the average wait times for takeoff and how far away are training areas going back to that one hour flight lesson waiting 10 minutes to take off would leave you with even less time if you have to fly to that practice area there are a lot of other questions you could ask here but these ones should be the ones on the top of your mind also realize that a school may have prepared answer for these questions which is why it's a good idea if you can ask to talk to one of their instructors or even some of their students you can also ask for references from former students just remember you're interviewing them for a job so feel free to ask for whatever you want all right it's time to talk about the elephant in the room money get ready for some sticker shock but remember you're here to collect information you just need to ask a few questions write down the answers and we'll go through it a little bit later ask how much it's gonna cost what your out-of-pocket expenses will look like and how they like to be paid being paid as in all up front partially up front pay as you go if you're planning on financing your training you can ask questions about that but it's a whole other video and we're not going to get into it in this one anyways you should also ask about the hourly rate of the planes and instructors and what they base their pricing off of that last question being really important so make sure to ask it last ask how much a discovery flight is okay so that interview is going to be a lot but it's important to go through it all to make sure you're making the best decision now if you have other flight schools that you want to check out it's going to be a rinse and repeat situation but once you've collected all the information you need it's time to go back home and take a look at it all remember when i said you needed to take notes and that you'll forget everything all right time for the next section evaluating schools so this is probably going to be one of the hardest parts of choosing a flight school looking at all the data evaluating it and narrowing them down so you can move on to our next step you're gonna need to weigh wants driving distances education aircraft training type scheduling airports cost guys the list goes on and on and we'll cover that last one in a second but unfortunately i don't have a lot of guidance on how to do all of this in the end you're the one asking the questions and getting a feel for the schools you're gonna have to decide which one is best for you on your own all i've done is load you up with the questions and things that you should be looking for so take some time to really dig into it and what matters most to you just realize there may not be a school that meets all of your wants but one of them should meet all of your needs and if you can't find a school that meets those you may have to start your search over looking in other areas right it's finally time to talk about money and we know this is going to be a big factor moving forward and you're probably going to see numbers all over the place pricing can be vastly different for a number of reasons but you should at least understand the why like one school may be having you fly older 172s their pricing would seem much more reasonable than a school that flies newer more expensive aircraft same thing for location schools that operate out of offices or fbos may be less expensive than schools that have dedicated buildings and hangers i think you get the idea and it kind of comes down to their overhead but watch out for comparable schools with very different pricing this comes down to how they come up with their numbers like some schools will take their rates and multiplying by the faa minimums their pricing may look fantastic by comparison and they may even say they have the best rates in town what they don't tell you is very few pilots pass at the faa minimums and you would be responsible for the additional flight time and training on the opposite end of the spectrum you have schools that charge more for their better education or prestige again realize that everyone passes the same tests gets the same certificates and ratings so that may be a moot point especially if you're trying to save money a good school is going to be upfront about their pricing they're probably going to give you numbers based off of operating costs averages and add a little in there for contingency but for the most part it should be relatively straightforward and they should let you know about any additional out-of-pocket costs but by asking the right questions during the interview their pricing should be reasonable for what they have to offer one thing that you may be surprised about is out-of-pocket costs depending on what school you attend things like learning materials headset testing fees uniforms and check card fees aren't actually covered and you're expected to pay for those on top of what you're paying to the school this should always be taken into consideration when you're looking at the overall cost of a certificate rating or program now i want to save red flags for a bit later but this one fits better right here and has to do with how schools like to get paid if you can find a school that lets you pay as you go that's great but most schools are probably going to make you pay in advance in some way it's normal to put some money down on an account and they deduct as you train you just have to add money back in every once in a while but schools that want you to pay up front for each certificate and rating should be a red flag there are several reasons this can be bad like what if you decide this school isn't right for you or you need to leave for some other reason and heaven forbid that the school actually goes belly up while you're training regardless it can be really hard to get your money back if at all now i know we said this would be in a separate video but it fits right here if you're going the finance route the money is usually paid directly and in full up front to the school and it's completely out of your control you for sure would want to talk to the school and lender if you have to stop attending or you may end up without a certificate in rating but a loan for one and because we're talking a little bit about financing most schools only offer it for part 141 programs because it's treated more like higher education that doesn't mean that part 61 schools won't have financing options if they do it's more like personal loans for each certificate and rating some of which you would need to pay back before you can get a loan for the next one but enough about that just do your homework before you finance something okay now there is one last thing to consider on pricing and that's overall program cost if you're in this for the long haul look at things as a whole what's offered if it gets you to where you need and what it's all gonna cost you may find that schools with similar pricing offer different add-ons or ratings and in the end making one school more valuable than the other all right we're done talking about cost but there is one last thing you should think about when evaluating schools choose the school that works best for you don't base your decision purely off of price a couple thousand dollars shouldn't be the reason you pick one school over another especially if you feel more comfortable with the more expensive school it could be that dedicated building or the nice aircraft that you think will make your education easier and that's okay because it's your choice moving on discovery flights so i bet you thought that after evaluating the schools you picked one well wrong what you were really doing is narrowing down the possibilities now it's time to see how things operate by going on a discovery flight at each one a discovery flight is a non-committal way to try out the school to see what training with them is really like and since you probably don't know what to expect we made a whole video on what a discovery flight is supposed to be like which we'll put down in the description this is an important step because now you're working with the school's front line and not someone trying to sell you something so you'll actually get to see how the school operates since schools come in all shapes and sizes and operate under different parts you may find that smaller schools have a more relaxed and easy going environment where large schools have a more professional and structured process for literally everything if you do a discovery flight with both types you'll see what i mean but the overall experience for both should be welcoming positive and educational you also have to ask yourself can i see myself spending a lot of time here oh and it would be a good time to pick the instructor's brain a bit more about the school especially if you're paired up with someone different than you talked to before now you have to realize that this is going to cost some money discovery flights aren't free but it's going to be money well spent to make sure you're putting your dollars in the right place and you still get to log the flight time so make sure you bring a log book and i'll put my favorite one down in the description but most of the time discovery flights costs instructor time plus flight time and my first discovery flight cost me about 200 now quick note i know some of you are saying well i can't visit or go on a discovery flight with the schools that i'm thinking about they're in another state or even another country and that's fine you can do the interview over the phone or through video conference to get as much information as possible but i still highly recommend you go on some sort of discovery flight prior to joining just to make sure that flying is your thing all right on to our next step picking and enrolling with all the research interviews and flights out of the way it's finally time to choose the right school for you and again i don't have much guidance on this for reasons previously discussed this decision is completely up to you go with the one that makes you feel the most comfortable and it's gonna help you reach your goals and is at the right price that you're comfortable with okay with your school of choice picked it's time to enroll not really one thing you should definitely do prior to enrollment is get your medical certificate many schools actually require it to make sure you're not wasting your money and their time if you're going to go the career path schools typically require a first class medical even though you don't need one at that time just to make sure there won't be any problems later on otherwise a third class medical is all that's really needed okay now it's time for enrollment get ready for paperwork and contracts make sure that you read everything very carefully remember flight schools are businesses and they're there to make money you just need to make sure that they have your best interests in mind and not theirs pay close attention to payments termination and refund policies and also understand your role as a student so that's mostly it for picking a school but we're not done yet here are a couple things to look out for when considering a flight school red flags if you will under quoting we talked about this in a little bit when we talked about pricing and faa minimums but if pricing is too good to be true it probably is being deceptive on aircraft and instructor availability this can keep you from reaching your goals in a timely manner make sure they have enough aircraft instructors ready when you need them you can also ask to see the school's flight schedules before you sign up expensive pilot supplies we talked about out-of-pocket expenses books and materials and all these things usually fall into this category but sometimes schools want you to buy them from them at ridiculously inflated prices and some of those things you'll never even use double check what you actually need and buy it elsewhere if you can just make sure you're getting up-to-date material aviation books are constantly being updated we'll get you there faster part 141 schools can get you certificates and ratings in lower flight hours in reality though you'll get them closer to the national averages so don't join a school based off of how few hours they can get you there guaranteed completion dates flight times and job placement everyone learns differently and at a different rate there is no way that someone can guarantee that you'll complete training by specific date or flight hours also unless they're planning on hiring you or have a proven job placement program or offer pipeline programs to the airlines don't believe that they're going to help you get a job in the end it's not their job last pay upfront we already talked about this one but avoid it if you can even if they offer discounts on flight training or other perks it's not worth the risk okay so those are good things from where you're looking for a flight school but i wanted to throw in a couple of things for after you start things that you should watch out for things that should make you consider changing schools compromising safety to save money this is a terrible practice and unfortunately being a new pilot you may not know what's going on and what to be even looking for if you feel like something's up treat every flight like the plane's broken until proven airworthy and then learn everything you can about maintenance schedules airworthiness directives and ask to see the plane's log books from time to time over training again one of those things that you probably won't realize until it's too late but sometimes schools will stretch out or over train students to run up the bill signs of these are excessive pre and post-flight briefings re-flying the same training over and over and failing stage checks for silly reasons if you feel like you're progressing and being held back talk to someone about it bad instructors fact is almost all instructors out there are teaching to build hours to move on to the airlines not all of them are good at what they do or have your best interests in mind if you feel like your training is subpar you should definitely speak up even worse if you're going on long flights without much training or purpose the instructor may be using you to pad their hours just be mindful of your time and progression all right guys that was a lot of fun and we're almost done i just have one more piece of advice to give you have fun learning to fly is incredibly rewarding and if you have any more questions outside of which flight school you should go to let us know down in the comments and we'll do our best to answer them all right guess who forgot to record an outro again this guy i wanted to thank you guys if you watch this whole thing i knew it was going to be super super long but the information inside of it is going to be absolutely invaluable anyways if you liked the video go ahead and give it a like and head on over to our channel page and check out some of our other content on helping you learn how to become a pilot and as always share aviation wherever you can and we'll see in the next one

Channel: Fly With The Guys

Views: 48,219

Keywords: how to become a pilot, pilot, pilot training, flight school, flight training, learn to fly, airplane, airport, plane, flying, flight, good flight schools, how to fly, aviation, avgeek, pilot school, picking a flight school, guide to flight schools, private pilot, private pilot license, private pilot certificate, pilots license, choosing a flight school, best flight school, best flight schools, best flight training, guide to flight training, worst flight schools, bad flight schools

Id: OruIC_mHXrc

Length: 24min 2sec (1442 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 26 2021