Delta drops degree requirement for pilots ...

weilke said:
Plenty of studying and classroom work involved in indoc and type ratings. It may well be that the airline has data that shows that people who have demonstrated the ability to study towards a degree for 3-4 years have a higher likelihood to complete that part of their training on the first try.
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If you are looking at two candidates with no experience it’s definitely an appropriate consideration.
 
jordane93 said:
Definitely interesting times. Never thought Delta would have another flow or drop the degree requirement. I still think 99% of the people that get called will have degrees.
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What's this 'flow' thing you guys are talking about?
 
UPS has officially dropped the requirement but I bet it’s 1 out of 200-300 who don’t have a degree. If your goal is the airlines, why not stack as many cards in your favor as you can?
 
luvflyin said:
What's this 'flow' thing you guys are talking about?
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You get hired at a regional airline owned by a major airline. Every new hire class at the major has a portion of the seats in class reserved for pilots from the subsidiary regional airline. Those pilots either don’t have to interview or have an abbreviated selection process. In the case of the AA regionals (envoy, PSA and Piedmont) there is no interview. Just a class date at AA. Only requirement is no disciplinary letters within two years and you have to be a captain.

It’s where all the B pay scale pilots work.
 
Tarheelpilot said:
It’s where all the B pay scale pilots work.
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finding-nemo-this-is-going-to-be-good.gif
 
luvflyin said:
What's this 'flow' thing you guys are talking about?
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See tarheel’s post. It’s also just a marketing scheme to keep regionals staffed. I’m happy for Endeavor. Lots of good guys are going to come over.
 
Tarheelpilot said:
You get hired at a regional airline owned by a major airline. Every new hire class at the major has a portion of the seats in class reserved for pilots from the subsidiary regional airline. Those pilots either don’t have to interview or have an abbreviated selection process. In the case of the AA regionals (envoy, PSA and Piedmont) there is no interview. Just a class date at AA. Only requirement is no disciplinary letters within two years and you have to be a captain.

It’s where all the B pay scale pilots work.
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So it's about pilots 'flowing' upward. Is Flow an actual word they like use in writing? Or just a colloquialism? If you're a flow, does it stick with you? Like, that's Bob, he's a flow.
 
Morgan3820 said:
My daughter had to write a crap load of essays to eventually get into medical school. None of which would make her a better doctor. But she was smart enough to write the essays anyway, rather than whine about how unfair the world is.
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Much of the value in writing essays is that it forces one to think, read, and think some more before putting pen to paper or taking some other action. Has this been written about before? What has been argued? Is there new evidence that challenges past ideas? What is the new evidence? How is this best communicated to my target audience? As I write this post, I am taking a break from writing on a project with conclusions that are very clear in my mind, and even so it is challenging to organize the data and thoughts on paper, but I am sure that when it is all done I will be that much stronger.

Even if a doctor does not do research or write actively, the base fundamental skills required to formulate a list of possibilities and logically argue for and against those possibilities are attained through challenging one's mind through math, science, literature, and writing.

On average, I do not doubt that the same is true in flying. I would agree that it does not make a hoot of difference with the stick and rudder skills.

<rant>
I have run into so many disheartening examples of "well, why do I need to know that" or "why do I need to do this" in order to become a _____. What ever happened to embracing opportunities and challenges? One of the goals of higher education is to challenge and sharpen one's mind. I was a pretty smart kid coming out of high school, but college gave me the tools needed to learn how to think critically, recognize fallacies, see my own faults and challenge my own thinking. Without this, I would have probably done fine in life, but I would have become a shadow of what I eventually did become. I have many great teachers to thank for that. Are they no longer out there?

Parenthetically, I have found it both disappointing and alarming how poorly kids are writing coming out of high school and even in college. I do not consider myself to be great or even good writer by any means, but I see very sad attempts at writing all too frequently. Many times, I simply do not know what a sentence means and too often I cannot identify a subject or predicate in some graduate level students' works. When conferring with colleagues outside of my region, they see the same. I would not want to be flown by anyone that only has a high school degree coming out of this recent generation. Things have changed since the times of my father when high school graduates could do some decent math, writing, and thinking.
</rant>
 
Salty said:
I think you’d be nuts to become a pilot without a degree. What the heck are you going to do if you lose your medical someday?
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Fly for an importer/exporter out of Colombia probably. I hear they don’t care much about the status of your medical certificate.
 
Salty said:
I think you’d be nuts to become a pilot without a degree. What the heck are you going to do if you lose your medical someday?
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Go back to school and get trained for a different job. Nothing that hard about it… when I had to leave flying for a bit I went to school and got hired into a law enforcement job. It’s life man. Just live it.
 
Tarheelpilot said:
Go back to school and get trained for a different job. Nothing that hard about it… when I had to leave flying for a bit I went to school and got hired into a law enforcement job. It’s life man. Just live it.
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Probably easier to just go ahead and get the degree when you’re young rather than later. Kids, bills, life in general make it hard for people to go back. Can’t count the number of people I was around in college who were going to take a semester or year “break”. Never saw them again.
 
Salty said:
I think you’d be nuts to become a pilot without a degree. What the heck are you going to do if you lose your medical someday?
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It's definitely important to have a Plan B, but as I learned during covid, a degree is merely one arrow in the quiver. I have two STEM degrees - one in CS as well as a few years of professional dev experience from before I turned to flying. When I went through my existential crisis in the spring of 2020, it quickly became obvious that I was essentially unemployable as a developer in all but the most entry level positions. Recency of experience matters!

So I tell folks that the best Plan B is to build a war chest that gives you time. Time to reinvent, maybe learn a trade, or as I discovered, time to get relevant again.
 
What field should a prospective airline pilot get a degree in if he wants to be employable when he gets furloughed after flying for 10 years?

I can’t think of a thing.
 
OneCharlieTango said:
What field should a prospective airline pilot get a degree in if he wants to be employable when he gets furloughed after flying for 10 years?

I can’t think of a thing.
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STEM and business degreed folks will remain employable. You might need to take a few classes to refresh yourself and learn the latest stuff, maybe get a cert or two. If you never worked in the field you’re looking at an entry-level job, of course, but age, maturity, and life skills will help you advance quicker than the youngsters.

But people who “can’t think of a thing” will struggle as always.
 
An entry level STEM job is better than minimum wage.
 
Half Fast said:
STEM and business degreed folks will remain employable. You might need to take a few classes to refresh yourself and learn the latest stuff, maybe get a cert or two. If you never worked in the field you’re looking at an entry-level job, of course, but age, maturity, and life skills will help you advance quicker than the youngsters.

But people who “can’t think of a thing” will struggle as always.
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Psht! Let’s break this “STEM” thing down. Remember, we’re talking about a bachelor’s degree.

Science: a bachelor’s degree in one of the sciences qualifies you to clean glassware in a lab somewhere. Without an advanced degree, your advancement opportunities are less than starting out in a welding shop.

Technology: a bachelor’s degree here doesn’t get you much more than a 12-week boot camp, except admission to grad school. A 10-year-old, unused tech degree is laughable.

Engineering: here’s a set of fields open to someone with a bachelor’s degree. But not 10 years after graduation.

Math: a bachelor’s degree that’s not worth much while the ink is wet, and nothing at all 10 years later.

Sometimes, someone who can’t think of a thing understands more than someone who has the answers.

Added to all of this is the fact that many (most?) airline pilots with 4-year degrees have them in professional piloting or some such.

But maybe there would be some value in a degree in aviation maintenance (add $50k tuition) or air traffic control (be willing to relocate).
 
OneCharlieTango said:
Psht! Let’s break this “STEM” thing down. Remember, we’re talking about a bachelor’s degree.

Science: a bachelor’s degree in one of the sciences qualifies you to clean glassware in a lab somewhere. Without an advanced degree, your advancement opportunities are less than starting out in a welding shop.

Technology: a bachelor’s degree here doesn’t get you much more than a 12-week boot camp, except admission to grad school. A 10-year-old, unused tech degree is laughable.

Engineering: here’s a set of fields open to someone with a bachelor’s degree. But not 10 years after graduation.

Math: a bachelor’s degree that’s not worth much while the ink is wet, and nothing at all 10 years later.

Sometimes, someone who can’t think of a thing understands more than someone who has the answers.

Added to all of this is the fact that many (most?) airline pilots with 4-year degrees have them in professional piloting or some such.

But maybe there would be some value in a degree in aviation maintenance (add $50k tuition) or air traffic control (be willing to relocate).
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Our experiences differ greatly. Of course, I’m assuming you actually earned the degree by understanding the subject.

Hint: the value in the degree ain’t the piece of paper or the ink on it.
 
The problem is, an airline jockey that’s making $150k+/yr would have a hard time going back to making an entry level salary in their supposed back up field of study, which I’d wager is the hardest part.
 
RyanB said:
The problem is, an airline jockey that’s making $150k+/yr would have a hard time going back to making an entry level salary in their supposed back up field of study, which I’d wager is the hardest part.
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Very true. Harder still to go work at McDonald’s.
 
Salty said:
Our experiences differ greatly. Of course, I’m assuming you actually earned the degree by understanding the subject.
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No reason to be impolite just because we’re strangers.

FWIW, I have 15 years of post-high school education in two scientific fields. I know some things about education.
 
OneCharlieTango said:
Psht! Let’s break this “STEM” thing down. Remember, we’re talking about a bachelor’s degree.

Science: a bachelor’s degree in one of the sciences qualifies you to clean glassware in a lab somewhere. Without an advanced degree, your advancement opportunities are less than starting out in a welding shop.

Technology: a bachelor’s degree here doesn’t get you much more than a 12-week boot camp, except admission to grad school. A 10-year-old, unused tech degree is laughable.

Engineering: here’s a set of fields open to someone with a bachelor’s degree. But not 10 years after graduation.

Math: a bachelor’s degree that’s not worth much while the ink is wet, and nothing at all 10 years later.

Sometimes, someone who can’t think of a thing understands more than someone who has the answers.

Added to all of this is the fact that many (most?) airline pilots with 4-year degrees have them in professional piloting or some such.

But maybe there would be some value in a degree in aviation maintenance (add $50k tuition) or air traffic control (be willing to relocate).
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As an engineer, I often served as a hiring manager for Lockheed Martin. I know who I and others would hire and I know how we evaluated qualifications. Mine is a well-informed opinion in this area.
 
RyanB said:
The problem is, an airline jockey that’s making $150k+/yr would have a hard time going back to making an entry level salary in their supposed back up field of study, which I’d wager is the hardest part.
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No argument. But that guy is still in a much better position than someone without a marketable degree.
 
OneCharlieTango said:
Science: a bachelor’s degree in one of the sciences qualifies you to clean glassware in a lab somewhere. Without an advanced degree, your advancement opportunities are less than starting out in a welding shop.
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It depends on the science and where one is hired.
 
I’m pretty sure my Economics degree from 6 years ago is useless. Heck, I couldn’t even get hired at Lowe’s when I thought I was going to get furloughed a year ago
 
OneCharlieTango said:
What BS degree is useful, cold for 10 years, and where? Honest question.
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Honest answer. Electrical engineering. (Just one example.)

Take a few classes to catch up on the latest in a specialized area such as antenna design or EMI test/analysis, learn the latest design and simulation tools, then apply to a defense or aerospace contractor. Most have trouble hiring in key areas such as RF, radar, power supply design, IR detectors, and a few others.

Be sure your background is clean enough for a security clearance (not an issue for most pilots). Be willing to accept an entry-level position.
 
jordane93 said:
I’m pretty sure my Economics degree from 6 years ago is useless. Heck, I couldn’t even get hired at Lowe’s when I thought I was going to get furloughed a year ago
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You was overqualified. Another thing some employers look at is retention. Don't always want to hire someone who they know doesn't really want to be there and will say take this job and shove it the minute something better comes along.
 
The backup job one can use once every couple years? Accounting/Auditing… CPA or CISA. We have people leave the field and come back all of the time. And there is always demand for labor, especially at junior levels at public accounting firms.

Keep up with your network and industry trends while flying, jump right in when furloughed.
 
Half Fast said:
As an engineer, I often served as a hiring manager for Lockheed Martin. I know who I and others would hire and I know how we evaluated qualifications. Mine is a well-informed opinion in this area.
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I know a gentleman who went back into engineering after 10 years in a unrelated field. What he does now has nothing to do with the area of his degree, the company that hired him didn't care as long as that diploma said 'engineer' on it.
 
kaiser said:
The backup job one can use once every couple years? Accounting/Auditing… CPA or CISA. We have people leave the field and come back all of the time. And there is always demand for labor, especially at junior levels at public accounting firms.

Keep up with your network and industry trends while flying, jump right in when furloughed.
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I believe that is what fellow POAer 'aterpster' did. There is an interview where he describes how he bounced back and forth between accounting and aviation work in the feast and famine cycles in aviation.
 
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