Hi guys, Im 20 years old and in my second year at a very nice university studying electrical engineering. I must say its tough as nails and its not the direction I want to go. It puts a knot in my stomach everytime a jet flys over the campus on final. Its really hard to stay motivated in circuit analysis when all I want to do is fly. I am doing ee as my safety net but i fear that once i graduate with it, it will be hard to say no to a 60k a year job to go on and get the rest of my ratings to fly for 20k a year. I guess what im curious about is i am very close to getting a general AS degree. How do the airlines look at those in comparison to the other guys with BA or BS. Im thinking of taking the AS and running with it to the nearest FBO and fly, fly, fly. Any advice??

Thanks

 

Short answer: don't quit. The airlines, namely the regional airlines are not hiring now, and many would argue they are not worth working for even during good times. Change majors if you don't like your major but stay in school and get that B.S. degree. You need a B.S degree as a fall back option if you become a pilot because they are frequently furloughed from flying for a year or more. You also need one if you ever hope to meet the minimum requirements at a major airline. Fly in your spare time while you are in school, it goes well with college and serves as a useful though expensive hobby. I was in your shoes 5 years ago, I dreamed of flying all the time while obtaining an aeronautical engineering degree, and the latter has been quite useful since then. I currently fly full time, so one can do both and the only thing trapping you at a desk is debt. Keep your debt down and you will be able to fly professionally later on.

 

If you're doing electrical engineering as a safety net, why not make that net as strong as possible while you have the opportunity.

You're not missing out on anything with regard to the aviation industry at the moment. Continue your bachelors (or even masters if you can hack it) and fly on the side if you can. Don't quit.

I've been furloughed a year and a half and so glad that my safety net (BSc Computer Science) was there, at least it gives you options!

 

Thanks guys i guess thats what I needed to hear. My school is really picking up in difficulty. Calc is crazy for me. It is hard to stay motivated with out just sayin to heck with it and flying some low end job, which I suppose is the easy way out. Nothing worth while is easy is what i hear. Ill just keep my nose up and keep on keepin on.

 

Well at my school they had all the pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps sorts of courses in the first three years, and by junior year only the serious students were left and then it was a lot easier. I was severely challenged by second year dynamics, I just had never thought like that before. Dropped the course, took it again in the summer, still could not work the problems fast enough, dropped that and took it again the fall. Did fine. I had done so many dynamics problems by then I had a 6 inch deep stack of notebook papers alone. Couldn't believe it, but by the end of all that practice I could do problems like a champ.

Just try and regulate your studying so that you always put in some minimum number of hours studying after class every single day, including Sunday. Take Saturday and do something else (fly). Be shameless about asking for help, even from friends. Go the library and find your classmates there and ask them to pal around while you do problems. Don't worry if you are truly lost early on in the semester, that's normal early in a course. If you are on the semester system it must be early, so stick with it and study. And schedule some flying lessons.

 

stay in school , locking yourself into the lowest paying jobs in aviation for your entire career would hardly be the easier way out. You ever wonder why those airline pilots don't want to fly fly fly and talk about their time off as QOL?

 

Definately stick with your current studies. I'm guessing you're not actively flight training at this moment? Either way, take some lessons, you can do your degree and do the lessons on the side because FAA ratings have no bearing on a college degree, and vice versa(well maybe some programs will honor the ratings).

With an EE degree, down the road you could set yourself up in the Avionics industry, and being able to fly would really give you an advantage over others since you know what it is pilots are looking for. Think about them apples.

 

There are a lot of threads about obtaining a degree - read them, they contain a ton of good advice. This industry is so fickle that down the road you will wish you stuck with school and achieved a four-year degree. If you quit now (after the AS degree) it will be much harder to go back later and finish up those remaining two years. Tough it out, get the four-year and then pursue your career. You can fly while getting your degree to build hours and have some fun, but seriously, stick with school until you have that degree in hand - it only gets harder to go back once you have a job and a few years under your belt.