Typeratings

[Pilot Oatmeal]

Yes, but let me get this straight, I barely got a B on my Maths GCSE, and I'm studying a BTEC National Diploma in Aviation Studies, not exactly your A-level student... I'll go to Uni and get a degree in Aviation Management, but not Aeronautical Engineering... so Im not sure im up the "mathematical standard" ... I am however a good PPL pilot lol

[GEnx]

You mean for pilot training? Those maths and physics requirements are very minimal.

[Pilot Oatmeal]

Yes for pilot training, my dad is VERY critical when it comes to my Maths standard, though I did get an A on my science GCSE, I barely got a B on maths 

[ukatlantic]

Yup, but BA is in a pretty poor financial state and Virgin only hires pilots with a certain number of hours on their logbook.

BA isnt in as bad state as you think, I saw their public accounts for last year and the had  around £1Billion in cash reserves and further access to the same amount again.  They aren;t going anywhere anytime soon.  As for Virgin I know about them, they were (not so sure if they still are) actively recruiting Pilots from the RAF and have done so for a number of years, which was a pain for me!

[ukatlantic]

You mean for pilot training? Those maths and physics requirements are very minimal.

A friend of mine is at Uni studying applied Mathmatics (was going to do Astrophysics or some other science guff) just so he's fully prepared for OAA when he starts in 3 years time  

[Pilot Oatmeal]

A friend of mine is at Uni studying applied Mathmatics (was going to do Astrophysics or some other science guff) just so he's fully prepared for OAA when he starts in 3 years time 

ahhh.... lol no way could i do that... Im studying a BTEC in Aviation (worth 3 A-levels)... then probably Aerospace Technology or Aviation Management

[Jona L.]

Yes for pilot training, my dad is VERY critical when it comes to my Maths standard, though I did get an A on my science GCSE, I barely got a B on maths 

B hey, I am happy if I can keep up me D+ but I am just too lazy to attend maths class, as I have schools WiFi (--> AWS!!!)

[Dorito_25]

Wow, I actually feel bad for all those pilot enthusiasts out there that have to get a loan to live their dream 

In Australia, they have this thing called HECS, which is an acronym for Higher Education Contributions Scheme (if you didn't already know). This means that a student at the university does NOT have to pay for the degree course fees at once, upfront, at the end etc. but they pay it with small fees when they get a full time job and this is done over a few years. I'm pretty sure a certain amount needs to be paid every year once the student starts a full time job, but it isn't a lot. They NOW are allowing students to HECS their university degree in Aviation, thank GOD!

Good luck to those studying 

[alexgv1]

The problem with getting your pilots license in the UK is that the government doesn't see it as education, but training. So things such as the HECS you mentioned above are available to university students through government funded schemes, but not pilots. It is not counted as full time education even though you spend some 30 weeks doing ground school, and on top of that, there are even no tax reliefs as it is counted as training. So you pay out of the nose to be part of an ab-initio training scheme which has nowhere near the infrastructure to cope with the rise in global demands for pilots, and don't expect it to get any help from the government now.

/rant

[cutchie]

I'd all but given up on the idea but then I discovered that Lufthansa pay for their pilots' ATPL and type ratings upfront, but you're locked into the company for 5 years or something. Never have I been so glad that I took A-level German!  

If you're proficient in German the link's here- http://www.lufthansa-pilot.de/ - it's worth a look but Google translate doesn't do a very good job if you can't speak the lingo.