I understand your perspective Watch This! but I think you're only half right. The cost, of course, is extremely high. If you're all about making money, aviation is not the right place for you. If you love to fly, CAPT will get you there. You won't pay back your loan making $17 an hour. But that number jumps to $25 or $33 an hour by your second year, which still probably won't pay back your loan but you're gettin there! Many people use the regionals as a stepping stone to the majors, as I plan on doing. Majors and legacy carriers are still paying their senior pilots upwards of $150k a year. Will you get the loan paid back? Obviously. As for the type rating... The MD-90 is simply a tool to prove to the regionals interested in the CAPT grads that they are more than qualified to fly (and captain) any of the jets out there today. So far, the all glass MD-90 (DC-9 type) full motion sim has been a huge selling point of the program to the regionals. The CAPT cadets are outperforming most of the new hires (with a LOT more flight hours) in both the sim sessions and the ground school at the places they've been hired because it's basically the same as the MD-90 training portion at CAPT. I think CAPT's reputation will start to change in the near future as it establishes itself more. It's still a brand new program, I think they've only graduated 20 or 30 something people. 4 of those are training on 747's right now in Miami at Focus Air. If you can get the money and you love to fly, CAPT can work for you. I believe Regional Airline Academy is very similar to CAPT, but I don't know much about it. I know they have a pretty big fleet! I've seen it down there. The only Piper planes CAPT flies are the Seminoles. The single engine stuff is all done in Diamond DA-40's. If you don't want to take my word for it, pay CAPT a visit. I expect it will be harder and harder to get into this program as time passes and we all know this is the best time to be going for those regional jobs. Hope this was helpful!