I love reading this stuff. In the not so distant past, I went to a DCA interview. I was warned against it by many of my acquaintances who worked there. I had a few close friends who, when meeting with them, would do nothing but complain about working at DCA. Yeah, they had free flight benefits, but they would frequently have such trouble catching a flight, they'd either not make it to where they were going until the next day, or have trouble coming back. One of them waited 3 days for a plane that they were finally allowed to take back home. What's more, even if you can fly to Paris; The City of Lights, or Sidney, or even The Big Apple, (Wow!) for free,.... at $14/hr. what are you gonna do there?? You wont have the money to stay. What are you gonna do, take a picture from the airport taxi stand, turn around and walk back to checkin??

As for the interview, what appears to be a knowledge or aptitude test, is in all reality a personality profile. Most kids (who DCA relies heavily upon not knowing when they're being completely Rogered) wont recognize it as such. On this timed test, they actually had the balls to ask,

"What is a Union? A) A perfect meeting of man and wife. B) A fair way to resolve labor disputes C) A dry soldered gasket at the 7th Fetzer valve junction."

Since I knew that no union represented airline would EVER get away with having that question presented during an interview, I answered what I knew. BEWARE. Although DCA is not an airline, nor do they have any unions (what a shocker), these people meet REGULARLY with all the regionals they refer applicants to. They know what most airlines are not looking for; future union delegates or pro-union people. Correct me if I'm wrong here, hasn't it been illegal to ask anything about unions during an interview for a union job since the Labor Acts were passed in the 1930's. It is however not illegal for a company like DCA to ask union related prequalifying questions at an interview FOR THEM.

Avoid working for DCA. You'll only be hanging yourself. If you do, I hope your parents live in Sanford, since, if you take a job with DCA you'll be forced to move back home.

In the end, I went with a 30/hr. flight school where I'm treated with the respect every professional pilot deserves and I'm not viewed as a "host" or "target".