10-Day Private Pilot Finish-Up Course

I spent ten days out in Lincoln California to finish up my private pilot certificate, and I couldn’t have been happier.

I started my training in a 141 school. The program was billed to me as a two-year program (since I had my gen eds out of the way) where I would finish with my four-year degree as well as a commercial certificate and maybe even my CFI certificate. That two-year program looked more and more like a three or four-year program just to get the flying done. The school spent a lot of time theorizing about how to get the max time from/for students, instead it pushed me behind. They also employed low time instructors (about 500 hours) who would spend several months trying to diagnose a problem. When I got fed up with the games I did some research and turned to AFIT.

The training was a lot more intense. Coming into AFIT I had about 30 hours and had not solo-ed. In the ten days I was with AFIT I flew more in ten days than I had with my previous school in six months. My instructor Andy, wonderful man, worked with me and had me flying solo in what seemed like no time after having been at a school that took over three months to teach me to properly land. He gave me a lot of tips and tricks to flying that a lot of younger kids may not think to teach. I don’t think I could have asked for a better instructor than Andy. While we certainly flew a lot, he made it a point to take breaks so that I was not completely burnt out.

Both 61 and 141 schools have their benefits, but for me starting 141 and ending 61 worked out wonderfully. Using the AFIT finishing course was definitely one of the smart things I have done with my aviation training path. Had I stuck with my former school I am certain that I would still be several months behind and not been able to catch up.

Throughout the sign-up period where I was paper pushing left and right to make sure that when I got 2,000 miles from home everything would be in order, Tony was there. While I am certain that there are people coming to this school from a lot farther away than me, I knew that I would be able to reliably get into contact with Tony even though I was three-time zones away. He was very responsive and worked with me when papers needed to be filled out.

Thanks AFIT