In the mid 1960's my father was approached by several airlines. He was only a private pilot but was told that at least UAL had its own flight training camp to take low or no time pilots all the way through the ratings. In the early 1990's I remember that UAL thought that there was going to be another pilot shortage and bought a dozen Frasca flight simulators in preparation for another flight training program. It never happened but the majors have always had in their minds of creating their own pilots.

Today however I think that pilot mills like ATP will be so successful that most Universities will eventually have to close their flight programs. Why waste 4 years in college when you could just go to ATP and be assured of a job at the end? In ten years flight schools will offer cadet programs for even the majors like Airtran and most jobs will come from those programs.

SkyHigh