2021 Mid Year Update

[Derek Hood]

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.

So let me see if I understand this.  Experienced controllers with years or decades under their belts are unhappy and leaving.  FNG's coming in as OBS/S1's getting an eyeful, then leaving shortly after joining.  Pilots are woefully unprepared, leading to negative experience for the experienced controllers.  Got it.

Experienced controllers leaving:
-Many of us have been there with lots of hobbies.  You set a goal, such as C1, work toward it, reach it, then realize that the fun was getting there, not being there. 
-Pilots ill prepared, reduce the immersion, and fun of controlling, resulting in no incentive to make controlling a priority when discretionary time is available.

New controller recruits leaving early:
-Excessive training requirements.
-Training based on "that's how we've always done it" mentality, prepared by people that have no background in teaching.
-Slow advancement.  Not enough on the job learning, and too much "sweatbox" with outdated scenarios that are counter productive
-Too many third party programs needed for a simple ATC session.

Pilots:
-In denial that even a little self study will go a long way in making their experience, and that of others much better.
-Refuse to start low and slow VFR, moving to flight following, graduating to GA IFR, then tackling airliners.  Nope, jump right into that PMDG 737, and go.


Solution:
-Narrow the gap between controller training, and pilot expectations. 
-Controller cert should not mirror real world exactly, and should not take a year to accomplish. More OTJ, low volume time on the live network, less didactic frat house training.
-Pilots should bear more responsibility for airspace knowledge.  New account good for VFR only.  Track account VFR flight following time, whenever a controller tags a users aircraft with a transponder code for flight following.  Set minimum hours, say 25 hours of VFR flight following in GA pistons.  Next step 25 hours of IFR GA pistons, tracked with controller tagging the user account by assigning the transponder code.  Then unlimited network use.

That is a very interesting idea, I like it.

Derek

[Robert Shearman Jr]

> "New account good for VFR only.  Track account VFR flight following time, whenever a controller tags a users aircraft with a transponder code for flight following.  Set minimum hours, say 25 hours of VFR flight following in GA pistons.  Next step 25 hours of IFR GA pistons, tracked with controller tagging the user account by assigning the transponder code.  Then unlimited network use."

I am a huge proponent of General Aviation on this network, but I completely flat out disagree that *forcing* pilots who are interested in airline flying (and are not interested in General Aviation flying) to fly General Aviation is the way to go here.  You cannot tell someone who is on this network completely to enjoy what interests them and what they consider fun, that they must first do something that doesn't interest them and they don't consider fun for X number of hours first.  It's just going to send them to other networks.

And many of them, if given the right resources and motivation could become perfectly capable sim airliner pilots without ever once having booted up a plane weighing less than 100,000 pounds.  There are, in fact, thousands upon thousands of pilots on the network on a weekly basis who fit that description exactly.

[Derek Hood]

> "New account good for VFR only.  Track account VFR flight following time, whenever a controller tags a users aircraft with a transponder code for flight following.  Set minimum hours, say 25 hours of VFR flight following in GA pistons.  Next step 25 hours of IFR GA pistons, tracked with controller tagging the user account by assigning the transponder code.  Then unlimited network use."

I am a huge proponent of General Aviation on this network, but I completely flat out disagree that *forcing* pilots who are interested in airline flying (and are not interested in General Aviation flying) to fly General Aviation is the way to go here.  You cannot tell someone who is on this network completely to enjoy what interests them and what they consider fun, that they must first do something that doesn't interest them and they don't consider fun for X number of hours first.  It's just going to send them to other networks.

And many of them, if given the right resources and motivation could become perfectly capable sim airliner pilots without ever once having booted up a plane weighing less than 100,000 pounds.  There are, in fact, thousands upon thousands of pilots on the network on a weekly basis who fit that description exactly.

Rob,

I also understand that there are countless pilots who do this, but there is a argument that many others bite off more than they can chew.  I think this is a problem that all of us see behind the scopes, yourself included.  You cannot disagree that since the release of MSFS it has definitely gotten worse with pilots not having nay clue on what they are doing.  With that being said, these new pilots choose not to learn or get better because there is no recourse for bad behavior or disregarding controller instructions, coaching etc....

Derek

[Robert Shearman Jr]

I don't disagree with anything you just said, Derek, but I do disagree that forcing them to fly General Aviation first is the correct solution.

[Nicholas Watkins]

Locked. If you have an issue, question, comment, or concern with regards to this thread, please take it to your RM or Mani directly.