AirportKid

Wow, firstly guys I would like to say thank you for this amount of of responses so quickly. Now let me address some of these things as best I can.

Skyhigh: Yes, I completely agree with you that by no means can anyone predict how the industry will turn out in the future whether its one year or twenty. However, I need to prepare as best I can, no matter what ends up happening. I feel that building as much time as I can, and doing it quickly is the best way to go, and that is the only way to "future proof" my self if regional mins do go up. If you have any suggestions of how to do this, please tell me lol

tylervet and OHPilot213 : Firstly, yes, my parents will be co-signing the loan with me that will get me the initial flight training funds. After that however, it is solely up to me as far as paying that back goes. Addressing the deferment: First let me say that I by no means took what the guy at ATP said as truth during all points of the conversation, I do realize he is trying to sell me a product. However the guy at ATP (take this with a grain of salt) said if I enroll in a full time online undergraduate program, that their loan provider (Sallie Mae I think?) will be able to defer payment until 6 months after I graduate or stop taking classes, in my case I obviously will be graduating. This is being enrolled FULL time. I know this would be difficult, but I like to think that I am a pretty hard worker.

So please, tell me if what I am saying seems unrealistic. This may be me simply being naive, but while I am working as an instructor at ATP upon completion of the program, I will get what, 50 hours a month? So if I graduate with the guaranteed 250, then work for roughly six months, my TT would be about 550, a good chunk hopefully being multi time. So I guess what I am asking is this: Is it not reasonably possible to be picked up at a regional with that amount of time?

You say that doing it this way would also be much more costly, but I am confused by that. I was under the impression that once done with my training, I will not be spending any more money after that, just working for them to build time. So basically my initial investment would only be the 55K for the program?

As far as regionals age requirements... well that is still to be figured out I guess. But I would imagine (You would obviously know better than me, just my opinion) that somewhere as long as you have the time and the ratings, you would be hire-able. Like I said, I could definitely be wrong, but I just dont see why the age would matter as long as you have the experience and flight time.

aviatoralex: Firstly, please understand that I know perfectly well what not attending a traditional four year school means. Trust me, I party all the time, probably too much :P...

As far as the actual degree, I am going to disagree with you here. Considering that IT and the Technology industry in general is far and away the most profitable industry in the nation, Computer Science would be a very good option. There are hundreds of thousands of well paying IT jobs out there that I could get with a Computer Science degree. Just about everyone in business today has a degree in business, so you need something that sets you apart. As far as it being an outdated degree, this simply is not true. If thats the case, then every middle aged business person would not be competitive because they got there degree 15+ years ago. Degrees, in my opinion, do not really become outdated.

As far as an aviation degree, I have heard time and time again from my own instructor let alone multiple people here on APC that a degree in something other then aviation is the way to go. My current instructor and good buddy of mine, CFI'ed at ATP after graduating with an Aviation degree from a typical four year school. Now that he is out of a job besides instructing, he says that he wished he had gotten a degree in ANYTHING other than aviation.

Sorry if some thoughts are unfinished, but im in a hurry to head to work now, will post more later tonight. Thx again guys