16
News / Re: Washington has a new Training Administrator!
« on: April 15, 2022, 05:00:44 PM »
Thanks everyone! Glad to be back. 
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17
Events / Re: [9/10/2021 2300z - 0300z] The JFK FNO
« on: August 23, 2021, 08:38:01 PM »Hey y'all. Couple things to keep in mind before judging this event. First, ZNY is breaking a grand total of...ZERO rules!! This has been approved by all of the necessary people and organizations, including VATUSA. Not to mention, it's not a single-field FNO—ALB and ORF are BOTH part of the event. We are, without a doubt, following the "rules implemented and agreed upon by every ARTCC." We all know this'll be a fun one.
Honestly, there’s one word I can think of to describe this event: awesome.
Mind kept, still judging. It won't be fun when we have to give N90 60MIT on the CAMRN....
19
News / Re: New Events Coordinator at Washington!
« on: July 19, 2021, 09:50:11 PM »
Congrats OT! You worked hard, and earned it. Plus, you were able to survive being my AEC. Don't burn the place down, and remember to stick it to em' when you have to!
20
USA Division Updates / Re: 2021 Mid Year Update
« on: July 06, 2021, 12:40:38 PM »Quote
Point 2 is beyond the scope of this Division update. I don't want to shut down that discussion, I just don't want it to override the purpose of this post.
Regarding the ARTCC ranking: This information is readily available to anyone that wants it on the various VATSIM statistic sites. I simply compiled the data by ARTCC. One of the purposes of VATUSA is to simulate the vNAS --a system that is available 24 hours a day. Many talk about the want of realism in the forums and Discord on a regular basis. Sending a pilot to UNICOM because controlled airspace is uncovered technically is not realistic. I value competent coverage. Notice I did not put the actual ARTCC uptimes in my post. For all anyone knows, the range between 1 - 21 could be a matter of minutes or it could be a very wide range.
Yes, this is a volunteer hobby. If you have a staff position; however, you volunteered for a non paid job. Just because you are not getting paid doesn't mean you don't have standards and expectations.
I am personally judging my success based on:
- Membership growth - The growth comes from OBS
- New member retention - What are we doing to increase training bandwidth?
- Increase in controller hours during non-event times - I value competent coverage day in and day out.
- Increasing C1 retention - The Command Center, Web Services Team, Social Media Team are non staff avenues C1 rated controllers can take advantage of to expand the hobby.
- Successfully developing a pilot community - Yes, pilots are our customers. Pilots have several online and offline choices to engage in flight simulation. Online controllers need pilots to practice their skills.
- Building a unified team of managers who are willing to champion the above.
Mani,
Point 2 directly impacts your division update in regards to uptime, whether you want to believe it or not.
"One of the purposes of VATUSA is to simulate the vNAS --a system that is available 24 hours a day." -- Do you honestly think that any facility is going to staff 24 hours a day for again, pilots that can barely fly a heading, maintain an altitude? Again, you need to address the issues as to WHY ARTCCs don't have higher uptimes, which pilot competency DIRECTLY affects.
"For all anyone knows, the range between 1 - 21 could be a matter of minutes or it could be a very wide range." -- Irrelevant. You presented the data in a ranked way, period. The difference between each ARTCCs uptime doesn't matter. Next time, maybe display the data as "VATUSA uptime for the past xxxx timeframe is".
"Yes, this is a volunteer hobby. If you have a staff position; however, you volunteered for a non paid job. Just because you are not getting paid doesn't mean you don't have standards and expectations." - No one is refuting that. We know what we signed up for. The problem lies within the shadows of RMs telling ARTCCs they need to do better, despite the fact that controlling on this network is more hassle than fun. Again, this is due large in part by incompetent pilots. Y'all don't care as to why, you're just trying to get numbers to look good on a spreadsheet. Enough with that. You're doing more harm than good.
"Increasing C1 retention - The Command Center, Web Services Team, Social Media Team are non staff avenues C1 rated controllers can take advantage of to expand the hobby." -- C1 retention will not be solved by offering shiny new badges and responsibility. You are ignoring the issues at hand. You should be doing more with VATSIM to come up with solutions with regard to pilot competency, not hounding the people that actually control on a day-to-day basis to do better.
"New member retention - What are we doing to increase training bandwidth?" -- New member retention is not just measurable by training. Culture is another example of what affects member retention, do better.
"Successfully developing a pilot community - Yes, pilots are our customers. Pilots have several online and offline choices to engage in flight simulation. Online controllers need pilots to practice their skills." -- I thought this was beyond the scope of the update?
"In my post, I didn't advise any facilities to staff more. I didn't assign any value judgement on an ARTCC's performance. I was recognizing facilities that have high uptime. If you are on an ARTCC's staff and are not satisfied with your uptime, what can you do to increase it? Marketing? Events? Partnering with an ATO? Nolan is brainstorming. More ideas are welcome. You can brainstorm in regions with your region manager if you would like, or a staff member can organize a group to brainstorm." -- You didn't advise any ARTCCs to staff more, but your RMs are. They were hired by you to instill your vision. If they're going against your vision, or distributing other information contrary to yours, what help is that doing? Time to clean house if you ask me, remember "Not in line with my vision" is a reason for termination!
I challenge VATUSA to do better by: 1) Listening to the underlying issues, and working with VATSIM to attempt to solve such issue. 2) Not hounding the very volunteers that do what they can day-to-day to actually keep VATUSA moving. 3) Not contradicting yourself in statements made by you, your RMs, etc.
All this is doing, is adding to the pile of reasons as to why more and more long-dedicated members are leaving the division, specifically regarding controllers. Don't ignore the underlying issues.
21
USA Division Updates / Re: 2021 Mid Year Update
« on: July 05, 2021, 01:56:21 PM »
Fair, it is cool to see who's at the top and who isn't. But what exactly is the point of ranking 'best to worst' in a volunteer organization?
I'd suspect that facilities under, probably 10th are getting messages or emails from their RMs with something along the lines of "You should do better in your facility" (in fact, I know some are). So let me dive into why this, in my opinion, shouldn't be done:
1) Each facility has a different membership base with different circumstances. Some have a lot of new-ish members that are just here to have a good time, some take it more seriously, etc etc. Yeah, they all have a VATSIM CID. Let's use, ZMP as an example (ranked last). (Using HOME controllers only) ZMP has 78 controllers on there home roster. Now lets take out the OBSs that can't do anything (29). Now we have 49. Now, lets take into consideration how many controllers actually have a cert for any level (GND, TWR, APP, CTR): 40. Now, lets look at ZMPs uptime on any level of controlling, YTD (1/1 thru 6/30): ~756 (+/- a few, math done by hand, and there's probably positions I missed). Lets take that 756 and divide that by how many controllers were active with certs (40). That's an average of 18.9 hours per active, certified controller. Take into account ZMPs activity requirement (3 hours per calendar quarter) and they're doing just fine per their required hours (6 hours required for the two quarters, Jan thru June...literally averaging triple their requirement). Point here is, you can't just rate this all by up-time. It should be done using the logic above, to actually see how their doing.
2) What is the UNDERLYING cause of controllers not wanting to control? P I L O T S. I'll be damned if I'm going to staff more than I'm required, when us controllers are held to a crazy high standard, yet the 13 year old that gets MFSF2020 can connect without actually being checked for competency to comply with basic ATC instructions. Obviously this issue goes higher than VATUSA, but VATUSA isn't doing anyone any favors by telling facilities towards the bottom of the list "You should be online more." What VATUSA COULD be doing to help improve and motivate controllers to do more than what it required, is to be up at the front door of the BOG, knocking until they actually start taking pilot competency seriously. IT IS NOT FUN when we get online, and have to hand hold 50% of the pilots on our frequency. That alone is a big reason why most facilities don't have an higher uptime. Then you need to account for environmental factors like, I don't know, actually having a life outside the hobby, LOAs, etc. Controllers are BURNTOUT from dealing with the pilots that do not know what they're doing. We can preach to them that they should read the Pilot Learning documents, but currently that is merely a recommendation.
3) Last year (IIRC), VATUSA was more worried about having exit interviews with S1s (who cares?) when we should have been focusing on our C1+'s that got fully certified, worked some hours, and went away. Who cares why the S1 who did minimal training to work a DEL/GND position left? You'd have much more meaningful feedback if we focused on the fully certified C1+s that left after certification. If we did that, I'm willing to bet that you'd be hearing the same thing about pilots over, and over, and over again...if you had that feedback last year, maybe we could have made meaningful impact network wide regarding pilot competency, and eliminating that as a factor for Burnout.
4) You don't motivate leaders/members of a volunteer organization by comparing them to the guy next door. You're treating this as a company-type measurable metric, as if the pilots are our customers. No. Don't. PLEASE DON'T. By reaching out to some ARTCC leaders and telling them "We think your facility should be on more" again, is ignoring the underlying issues at hand. We need to first address the WHY, fix those issues, THEN we can begin to make headway in uptime.
Disclaimer - I wouldn't have made this post, if some ARTCCs weren't being told to "Do Better" when there are things that need to be addressed first, before we start asking more of VOLUNTEERS. This isn't meant to be an attack [insert legal jargon here] but is just honest feedback from a concerned VATUSA member
.
I'd suspect that facilities under, probably 10th are getting messages or emails from their RMs with something along the lines of "You should do better in your facility" (in fact, I know some are). So let me dive into why this, in my opinion, shouldn't be done:
1) Each facility has a different membership base with different circumstances. Some have a lot of new-ish members that are just here to have a good time, some take it more seriously, etc etc. Yeah, they all have a VATSIM CID. Let's use, ZMP as an example (ranked last). (Using HOME controllers only) ZMP has 78 controllers on there home roster. Now lets take out the OBSs that can't do anything (29). Now we have 49. Now, lets take into consideration how many controllers actually have a cert for any level (GND, TWR, APP, CTR): 40. Now, lets look at ZMPs uptime on any level of controlling, YTD (1/1 thru 6/30): ~756 (+/- a few, math done by hand, and there's probably positions I missed). Lets take that 756 and divide that by how many controllers were active with certs (40). That's an average of 18.9 hours per active, certified controller. Take into account ZMPs activity requirement (3 hours per calendar quarter) and they're doing just fine per their required hours (6 hours required for the two quarters, Jan thru June...literally averaging triple their requirement). Point here is, you can't just rate this all by up-time. It should be done using the logic above, to actually see how their doing.
2) What is the UNDERLYING cause of controllers not wanting to control? P I L O T S. I'll be damned if I'm going to staff more than I'm required, when us controllers are held to a crazy high standard, yet the 13 year old that gets MFSF2020 can connect without actually being checked for competency to comply with basic ATC instructions. Obviously this issue goes higher than VATUSA, but VATUSA isn't doing anyone any favors by telling facilities towards the bottom of the list "You should be online more." What VATUSA COULD be doing to help improve and motivate controllers to do more than what it required, is to be up at the front door of the BOG, knocking until they actually start taking pilot competency seriously. IT IS NOT FUN when we get online, and have to hand hold 50% of the pilots on our frequency. That alone is a big reason why most facilities don't have an higher uptime. Then you need to account for environmental factors like, I don't know, actually having a life outside the hobby, LOAs, etc. Controllers are BURNTOUT from dealing with the pilots that do not know what they're doing. We can preach to them that they should read the Pilot Learning documents, but currently that is merely a recommendation.
3) Last year (IIRC), VATUSA was more worried about having exit interviews with S1s (who cares?) when we should have been focusing on our C1+'s that got fully certified, worked some hours, and went away. Who cares why the S1 who did minimal training to work a DEL/GND position left? You'd have much more meaningful feedback if we focused on the fully certified C1+s that left after certification. If we did that, I'm willing to bet that you'd be hearing the same thing about pilots over, and over, and over again...if you had that feedback last year, maybe we could have made meaningful impact network wide regarding pilot competency, and eliminating that as a factor for Burnout.
4) You don't motivate leaders/members of a volunteer organization by comparing them to the guy next door. You're treating this as a company-type measurable metric, as if the pilots are our customers. No. Don't. PLEASE DON'T. By reaching out to some ARTCC leaders and telling them "We think your facility should be on more" again, is ignoring the underlying issues at hand. We need to first address the WHY, fix those issues, THEN we can begin to make headway in uptime.
Disclaimer - I wouldn't have made this post, if some ARTCCs weren't being told to "Do Better" when there are things that need to be addressed first, before we start asking more of VOLUNTEERS. This isn't meant to be an attack [insert legal jargon here] but is just honest feedback from a concerned VATUSA member
.22
News / Re: New Denver ATM Selected
« on: June 28, 2021, 02:36:39 PM »
Didn't see that one coming!
23
Events / Atlantic Route Madness
« on: June 19, 2021, 06:51:40 PM »
Join the Washington (ZDC), Jacksonville (ZJX), and Miami (ZMA) ARTCCs for a once-in a blue moon Friday the 13th FNO where we staff up key airports in the mid-Atlantic network (2300z - 0300z) to bring you a night of fun! Featured fields include KIAD, KRDU, KMCO, KJAX, KMIA, & KFLL!
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Events / Re: Carolinas Crossfire
« on: June 14, 2021, 08:42:12 PM »We all know AVL is the best field on this list
Negative, ghostrider. It's def Wilmington.
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News / Re: ZMA has a new ATM!
« on: May 16, 2021, 06:58:17 PM »
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I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU! I'M SO EXCITED FOR YOU!
That is all.
26
Events / Re: Triple Crown FNO
« on: April 21, 2021, 05:45:10 PM »
To be clear, ZDC is staffing BWI (Baltimore)!
27
News / Re: ZAU's New ATM
« on: March 30, 2021, 11:14:56 PM »
Congratulations, Jamar!
I agree Chicago was in dire need of a revamp. Dristin and his team were able to accomplish that. Jamar, keep it moving in the right direction!
I agree Chicago was in dire need of a revamp. Dristin and his team were able to accomplish that. Jamar, keep it moving in the right direction!
28
Events / 4th of July Preparty
« on: February 24, 2021, 12:14:02 PM »
It's that time of the year again, where Jared brings the brisket, Ray brings the beer, and Dylan brings the excitement! Join the ZDC ARTCC as we staff up PCT for our annual 4th of July Preparty! We will be staffing up Baltimore (KBWI), Washington (KDCA), and Washington-Dulles (KIAD) from 2300z - 0300z on 7/3/2021! What better place to celebrate our independence than in our great nations capital?!
29
Events / The Virginia Showdown
« on: February 17, 2021, 10:53:21 AM »
Join the Washington DC ARTCC on 4/18/2021 from 2000z - 0000z as we staff up KORF, KRIC, & KCHO for the first ever Virginia Showdown! Which airport will come out on top? You'll never know if you don't join in on the fun!
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Events / Washington's Class D Shenanigans
« on: January 23, 2021, 01:40:44 PM »
It's time for some fun shenanigans within a few of DC's core class Delta airports! Bring out the corporate jets, turbo-props, and other types to enjoy a great afternoon of fully staffed satellite airports! We'll be staffing KHEF (Manassas), KMTN (Martin State), KMRB (Martinsburg), and KFDK (Frederick) from 1900z-2300z (2pm - 6pm Eastern).