I don't know all the little details of aviate but what you are describing is how it has worked for the past 20 yrs. They have these preferred regionals or CPP or aviate which do nothing but put the really hungry people behind a stack of indifferent applicants. Take a look at any class and you see repeating group sizes. 50% of the hiring is military, 30% goes to big regionals like skywest or republic, and the rest is from all over. The really hungry people network their butts off EVERYWHERE and take the first decent job and you still keep your apps up to date and in primo condition until you are satisfied. The party can come to a screeching halt, new people could rethink Uniteds hiring matrix logic which has changed multiple times, or you could be at a LCC when they are bought or merged for better or worse. There have been multiple people from pretty big airlines in the past few classes and I know they were hired outside of aviate. Is that not a thing going forward?

If you go somewhere and pass the background checks, add a type, and no issues come up it is a selling point for you here at United. You are trainable and adaptable and are still applying to United... all good things. I don't think aviate is the fastest route here.