Everything that rickair said is 100% true. If you don't get a degree, good luck ever flying for anyone but regional. What is two years of schooling compared to a lifetime of regional flying. Some people love it, and if you are one of those people go for it. Everyone these days applying at something other than the regionals(i.e. majors, netjets etc...) has a college degree. If they got hired without it, than they were extremely lucky. I used to work at ATP and the CFI program has alot of success, but you need to do alot of prep before hand. Ya it is a two week program, but alot of it is getting used to the Seminole, Garman 430, making and presenting lesson plans and going over the PTS and important FARs. I hated the pay at ATP but I learned alot about flying while I was instructing there, and like rickair said, whenever I make Captain, I am sure that the instructing experience I had will help out greatly. You learn how to work with every type of person and it helps build patience and it makes you a more proficient pilot. You are responcible for everything so you have to do at least twice the work if not more than the student flying. If something were to happen in the future, say a furlough, if you have your CFI, you could find something to fall back on until you found another job or got called back. Plus, most pilots applying to the regionals have their CFI and that is one more aviation related item to help boost your resume. But the only thing that is right is what you want. We just put our 2 cents in, if you don't want to finish college and be a CFI than don't. Like I said, it is about what you want, not everyone on these forums.