Originally Posted by
Nezaros
Hi everyone, new to the forum here. I've read a few of the threads but I'd still like a bit of advice / answers.
First off, I'm currently a freshman at a little community college with a flight program, haven't gotten my Private yet but pretty close, and after reading and hearing all about the good and bad of the aviation industry I'm still fairly certain it's where I want to go in life. The issue I'm having is deciding exactly how to get there. My end goal is to fly commercially in Asia, probably airlines. I understand that a four-year degree is a great help, but after my two years here (after which I should have my CPL) I'm unsure about what I ought to do. The most common route appears to be building hours as a flight instructor but I'd really like to avoid instructing if at all possible. What then, are there any viable alternatives on which to scrape by? I figure I'd work whilst finishing a four-year degree, but is that degree really necessary? I'm eager to move out of the US and start working in the Philippines but of course I don't want to screw myself over in the long run.
You are not alone in wanting to avoid instructing, but I think it is a great opportunity to learn a TON. After going through flight training at a reasonable sized 141 school, many of my peers are trying to avoid it. I, however, took a job at our flight school, got all my ratings (CFI/CFII/MEI) and kept pressing on. I've learned more than I thought I would and relearned many things I thought I already knew and had a handle on, but really did not. I'm at about 800TT and still learning, still striving, and still loving flying. It has its bad days, mostly depending on the student, that you won't enjoy it as much as others, but what job doesn't? There are VERY few jobs that are out there that you can get low time. All of the pilots that decided to avoid instructing and try to find those low time jobs are still looking, not flying, and getting rusty very quickly.
My advice, instruct. Learn as much as you can, build your time and enjoy it for what it is. You will be a better pilot for it and the amount you learn is invaluable to your future flying career. And you can continue looking for other flying jobs while your instructing and at least getting paid to fly.
Character building.