Well said. Are you getting a 4 year degree at UND? If so, there is no question in my mind that you should stay there. Yes, the topic of the 4 year college degree has been beaten to death, so I am going to copy/paste my response as to why it is important. But if you are 75% there, just wait 1 more year. It is so worth it.

Let me throw out a few situations...

-You are 40 years old, flying for a living, making good $$$ with a wife, 2 kids, and a home. You go to the doctor to get your 1st class medical, but your blood pressure is too high! No medical certificate. Now what? Will you go and wait tables for minimum wage? Should have gone to college to get that degree.

-You are 40 years old. Been at a regional airline for 15 years, making 80k a year. Plenty of PIC turbine flight time. More than enough to go with a good airline that will soon pay you more than twice what you make at that regional. Southwest, FedEx, whatever major airline is doing good at the time. Oh well, majors are out of the question. Should have gone to college to get that degree.

-You are 25 years old. You are a FO at your regional. Suddenly, your airline goes out of business. The economy is in a recession, and therefore multiple airlines have pilots on the streets. Sure, there are 1 or 2 companies hiring, but those 10,000hr airline guys are taking those jobs. No good flying jobs anywhere. Aviation sucks. I want to get out, but how? Should have gone to college to get that degree.


If there is one thing I can tell you about the airline industry with absolute certainty, it's that there is NO CERTAINTY! The only stability is INSTABILITY. This industry is cyclical. One day Pan Am and TWA are ruling the sky. The next day they don't exist. One day your making 300k a year with a fat pension. The next day you take a 30% paycut with almost no pension. One day your on the top of the world flying a Boeing 737. The next day your unemployeed.

This is where the college degree comes in. You should be prepared. At the bare minimum, a college degree is a good backup in this unpredictable industry. If it gets so bad that you (or your family) cannot handle it, get out. But you will be hard pressed to find a good job without a college degree. Not to mention you are cutting your aviation career opportunities in half. WITHOUT a college degree, your career will likely end at a regional making a max of 90k a year. WITH a college degree, your career can end at a major airline, flying heavy jets, making 180k a year. By not getting a college degree, you are ultimately trading A LITTLE money now for A LOT of money later on. You will be kicking yourself later for that decision.

If for nothing else (backup, aviation career opportunities, etc...), getting a 4 year degree should be the best 4 years of your life. They were for me. They are for most people. And you will be a better, more educated person.
I know some smart people who didn't get college degrees. But I can tell you that ALL of them (yes, every single one) wishes they had got a college degree, and they highly recommend getting one to younger kids. Not that you can't be successful without a degree, just that it is a lot harder and a lot more unlikely.

I would recommend with all my might that you get a college degree.


Also, the mesa program is a bad deal. Not because of the whole fly a jet a low time thing, but because they require u to get an AA degree. Why do u wanty an AA degree. It is worthless. You should either get a college degree, or no degree at all. An AA is useless. Since you will already have a 4 year degree, you will waste a lot of time there (in other words, it will take you longer to start flying than if you had been instructing).

As for the general pay for FO training route, I think still grounded brought up a big point that they don't advertise. To upgrade to captain, you must have 500PIC. You will only have about 100PIC. So you must have your 1500TT PLUS an extra 800hrs to make up for that missing PIC. To get from 300hrs (all your licenses and ratings) to 2300hrs, you must spend 3-4 years as a regional FO. That is too long. Regional FO is a worse job than flight instructing. You make more $$$ as a flight instructor, and you are home everynight. So why would u want to skip instructing? That ATP upgrade requirement is something that these airline academies do not advertise, and for good reason.

Your best bet is to finish college, get your licenses and ratings, instruct for about a year, then move onto a regional of your choice.