How can we teach our learners beyond the ACS?
Hey, MZeroA Nation, Jason Schappert here of MZeroA.com.
This is--
I share this every month, I feel like.
It's my favorite podcast, I'm not going to lie,
the CFI, Certificated Flight Instructor Podcast.
Question for you: where are you right now?
You should be at Oshkosh, as of this posting.
Obviously, I'm home in Florida, in our studio, right now.
But, I'm actually at Oshkosh.
This was just recorded well in advance.
Will you come say "hi?"
We're in Hangar B, Hangar Bravo.
I hope you'll come and check us out and say "hi."
If you're watching this on the day this post,
this is also the day of our super-exclusive top-secret
little party that we're doing at Oshkosh for so many of you.
So, if you're watching this the day of, I hope to see you tonight.
If not, if you want to listen to this later,
I hope you had a great time with that.
I'm just excited to be back to normal.
Really, I want better than normal.
That's what I'm really after with this.
But, I'm just excited that life is getting back to normal.
We may still be doing fist bumps and that sort of stuff for a while,
but we're getting better.
And, I'm quite excited about that.
CFIs, future CFIs, aspirational CFIs, and everyone else listening,
how on earth do we teach beyond the ACS?
ACS, we know, stands for Airmen Certification Standards.
I find it very ironic.
And, you could be listening to this well into the future,
but as of this recording,
CFI is still one of the few ratings,
and there are some certificates, for that matter,
that is still under the PTS.
I find it very ironic.
I earned my CFI to Practical Test Standards.
Yet, I am quizzed on private pilot
and commercial pilot airmen certification standards.
Isn't that a little ironic with that?
There's just some discrepancies between the two, but it's all good.
Certainly, nothing we can't work through with that.
We'll focus on the ACS because I know, one day,
the world will be a better place and CFI will go to the ACS.
But, in the meantime,
how on earth do I teach our learners beyond the ACS?
How do I teach beyond the ACS?
The ACS--
A wise checkride examiner once said this to me.
This was in reference to the PTS many, many years ago,
but it relates so perfectly to the ACS as well.
The ACS is the worst you can do and still become a private pilot.
When you think about it that way, it doesn't sound so appealing, right?
You're thinking, "Everyone else says, I fly to--"
I love this, they say, "I fly to ACS standards."
Well, that's like saying,
it's the Airmen Certification Standard, so when you say, "ACS standard,"
you're saying, "Airmen Certification Standard standards."
It's like when someone says,
"Go to the ATM machine, automated teller machine machine."
It's a Jasonism, perhaps.
You'll always hear me say Airmen--
or you'll hear me say ACS guidelines, which sounds a little better.
Airmen Certification Standards guidelines.
That doesn't sound good now that I say it out loud.
When you think about it, though, when someone says
that's the worst you can do and still become a private pilot,
it makes me think a little bit.
Wow, I don't want to do just enough to get by.
Nobody wants to get a 70% on their knowledge test.
Although, I've done that before, embarrassingly enough.
Many of you know my story long, long, many, many decades ago now, I guess.
Not quite decades.
Decade and then some years.
But, you'll look at this and think,
"How can we be teaching our learners beyond the bare minimums?"
And, I think that's the first way to approach it.
These are just the minimums.
These are just the standards.
About four, maybe five, weeks ago--
So, I do a show called Inflight Coffee every Saturday, 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time
on the MZeroA Facebook page.
And, one of them, recently,
it would have been over the 4th of July weekend.
So, you can go back and check it out.
That would have been July--
I think, it would have been July--
Let me look at the calendar.
Maybe, it was July 3rd.
Whatever that Saturday is closest to July, it would have been July 3rd.
Go on the Facebook page, July 3rd, 2021, if you're interested in this topic.
And, I talked about just being suitable.
I gave that analogy, Magda--
Many of you know Magda, my lovely lady.
Magda and I were on the road,
just enjoying a nice 4th of July weekend, out traveling.
And, you know I enjoy my coffee and my good book and just like,
in that case, on the terrace.
We're pretty boring people.
And, I was getting my coffee ready for Inflight Coffee
and I become like this coffee-snob, in a way.
I promise I'll relate this to ACS here in a second.
I've become this coffee-snob a little bit.
I don't like a Starbucks coffee.
I'd rather give the business to a mom-and-pop shop, anyways.
And, I find their coffee is usually more fun.
And, there's a story behind it and everything else, too.
But, this hotel just had a little Mr.Coffee.
And, the thing I told to Magda when I made it, she says,
"How was the coffee?"
I said, "It's suitable."
And, that word struck me.
I don't know where it came from.
"Suitable."
I thought, "No one wants suitable coffee."
And, I took it out a step further.
Think about your personal life.
No one wants a suitable relationship.
No one wants suitable finances.
And, no one wants to be suitable
in their flight training
or in their safety, or in aviation as a whole.
I think being suitable is just doing what the ACS says,
to the bare minimums, the standards.
Because that's what they are.
You want to be above average.
Are you a C student?
Are you an A student?
Well, don't think back to high school because I was the C student,
C-minus student in some cases.
In aviation, let me tell you something.
I know we're using cute examples and everything else, but in aviation,
there's no option to be a C student.
A C student ends up in the NTSB reports.
I don't know how else to put it.
I'm sorry to put it so bluntly.
You have to always be pursuing more.
I am not worried about you.
And, I'm literally looking--
I know there's many of you listening to this on Audible, on iTunes.
You can't see me.
Some of you watching us on YouTube and Facebook.
I'm looking you square in the eyes right now.
And, let me tell you something.
I am not worried about you.
When I was learning to drive, my mother always told me,
"Jason, I'm not worried about you driving.
I'm worried about everybody else out there driving."
I think maybe your mother and father, whoever taught you to drive,
probably told you something similar.
"I'm not worried about you."
I'm worried about everyone else who's not listening this.
I'm especially not worried about you
because you are either, A, CFI or, B, an aspiring CFI,
taking 15 minutes out of your day to listen to this,
to learn more, to better yourself.
And, this may not be your first episode.
And, if it is, it probably won't be your last episode,
because you've got dozens of other episodes to just go catch up on.
And, by the way, if you're really hungry, we have the Private, the Instrument,
and the Commercial Pilot Podcast, three other podcasts to listen to.
Again, Audible, iTunes, just search them out on there.
You can find it.
It's incredible to me, absolutely incredible to me,
that people are just okay getting by with the standards.
It is no different than getting a 70% on your knowledge test.
It is no different than,
"When's the last time you did stalls or steep turns, Jason?
Probably, two years ago in my last flight review with you,
24 calendar months ago."
I share that because I've heard it before.
I hate it.
Why can't we continue to practice?
Why can't you set up a schedule every six months
you just do a quick lesson with a CFI, just a little tune-up?
Why can't we do at least just that?
That's what we're after,
and that's what I want to foster and work to create.
All this being said,
what do you do and how do you teach beyond the ACS?
You say, "Jason, beyond the ACS.
The ACS says, for private pilot,
for a short-field landing, zero feet in front,
no more than 200 feet beyond.
I'll hold them to 100 feet.
Commercial standards, that's what I'll hold them to."
That's not what I mean.
I am not asking you to hold them to higher numeric standards.
I'm not asking you to, in your mind, say, "The FAA gives us a 200-foot window.
I'm only going to give them 100 feet."
I'm not asking for that.
Those are still numeric standards.
What I'm asking you to do
is give them the real-world applicability of it.
Practicing a short-field landing on an 8,000-foot runway
has zero consequence.
Right?
In fact, the sight picture is so skewed,
I don't even know if it's doing the learner a service.
We have a little airport here called Cedar Key,
2,200 feet, paved, water on either end.
2,200 feet, not that big of a deal,
not that difficult for someone like you or I
to go in and out of there quite easily.
Still on our toes, but not terrible.
Water on either end,
there's a little psychological factor there to it.
But, to a 30-hour learner, 30-hour student pilot,
that might as well be an aircraft carrier to them.
Do you have airports that can show them
the importance of a short-field landing?
And, by the way, a short-field landing, team, I don't know why,
but I have a heading indicator here, for some reason.
You can't see this, some of you,
but I'm holding up the heading indicator as if we're on a runway.
I'll explain it here for everybody listening and watching this.
A short-field landing
doesn't have to be a 2,000-foot strip.
It could be a 3,000-foot strip with an obstacle.
You see, if I have an obstacle at the end of my fictitious runway,
my actual, what's called,
effective runway length could be cut in half,
if it's a big enough obstacle I have to clear.
So often, we forget.
We think short-field landing, short runway.
And, that is the case many times.
But, it could be a long runway, like a 3,000-foot-long runway
with a big building or tower or a tree,
a stand of trees right at the end of it, that shorten the effective runway length.
You can use it all for takeoff,
but you can't use it all for landing, obviously.
Do you understand?
Can you take your learners to a real soft field?
Can you give them an engine failure down to landing on a real soft field
or at a minimum,
an engine failure at 3,000 feet down to a landing on a paved runway?
Can you give your learner experiences?
That's what I'm really meaning with all of this.
I know, some of you are stuck within the confines of a 141 syllabus.
I love 141.
I think it provides the structure that many CFIs and many learners need.
As long as I--
I've never run across a 141 syllabus that doesn't allow me to go above and beyond.
All I have to do is the items listed in that TCO,
in that particular lesson plan for that day,
TCO is Training Course Outline,
in the particular lesson 12 for that day, I have to do this, this, and this.
As long as I accomplish all those things, it doesn't say, "Well Jason, no.
It only says we can do three landings today."
That's not how it works.
You can do 10 landings, as long as it's three or more.
I'm allowed to certainly exceed the lesson plan and what it says.
And, I think that's what proves so important.
And, I know there's record-keeping and everything else that goes into that.
I love the 141 environment.
Don't tell me the 141 environment has you in handcuffs
because that's not true.
The 141 environment provides you amazing structure
that you can then add to.
And, don't tell me the 61 environment is too unstructured
because you can do what I used to teach, which I call Part 61 and a half.
Whereas, I take the freedom of a 61 curriculum,
but the structure of a 141 syllabus, and I customize it to my learners.
That's how you go beyond the ACS.
When your learner says they want to do a cross-country
and their main reason for learning to fly
is to go see the grandkids who live in Georgia.
You better believe one of our cross-countries
is going to be the exact airport you are going to be flying to,
to go see the grandkids.
In fact, I want the grandkids to come to the airport to watch grandpa land
on our dual cross-country.
And, I want to meet them too, because I, as your flight instructor,
want to know who I'm doing this for as well.
Because I'm not doing this for me.
I'm doing it to see you light up when you get to give those grandkids' hugs
who you only get to see once a month because they live so far away,
and it's a four-hour drive or it's a two-hour flight.
That's what this is all about.
That's what beyond the ACS really means.
CFIs,
if you think you can have a syllabus where it's a one-size-fits-all,
it meets the engineers' learning preferences,
it meets the entrepreneur type A personalities learning preferences.
It meets the retiree who wants to see the grandkids' preferences,
versus the young kid who wants to have a career in aviation preferences,
those are four very different personas, buyer personas,
that purchase flight training.
And, they can't all be marketed to the same.
They cannot all be sold the same.
They cannot all be taught the same.
There's so many facets to this in what we do.
MZeroA Nation, you have such a responsibility as a flight instructor.
I know a college degree is required, a bachelor's degree is required.
For most aviation careers that you want to pursue,
you need a bachelor's degree.
And, associates just won't do it much anymore.
They're not always picky about the bachelor's degree,
but I always encourage you to get
a Bachelor's Degree in Aviation Management,
because I think it's important to have the business components of that.
I would add as an elective, can you take a psychology class, too?
Because let me tell you something.
As a flight instructor, you are an entrepreneur,
even if you work for someone else's flight school
because you are the sales force.
You're a sales team member.
You're a psychologist.
You are a lifeguard because you save lives every single day.
You are an encourager.
You are a mentor, a coach, a leader,
and an example.
I don't think the fundamentals of instruction written test
tests for any of those things.
Certainly, there's no one who ever tell you
how to be a business leader
when it comes to becoming a flight instructor.
That I had to learn.
People often ask, "Jason, how did you become an entrepreneur?"
I became a flight instructor.
That's how I became an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurship and sales and marketing is thrust upon you
when you become a flight instructor.
You're in sales and customer service from day one as a flight instructor,
because your phone doesn't stop ringing and text message questions and emails
and everything else.
You're thrown right into it.
And, no one prepares you for it.
The MZeroA online ground school will, though.
New CFI course we're actually shooting now.
Very excited about that.
Nation, you're a blessing.
I love this podcast.
I could go on and on for hours about this,
but my goal is always to keep these around 15 minutes
because that's the average commute, not that everyone commutes anymore.
But, if you need more content,
do know that we produce the Private Pilot Podcast,
the Instrument Pilot Podcast, the Commercial Pilot Podcast.
On Audible, we have all our audiobooks as well.
"Aviation Mastery," the book,
will be shipping the end of August as well.
So, looking forward to that.
Be a light in an otherwise dark place, and be a blessing to others.
Have a wonderful, outstanding, blessed rest of your day.
And most importantly, remember,
that a good pilot is always learning.
Have a great day, everybody. I'll see you.