This question comes from David:
Hi, I am a medical student and I wish to become a pilot after I finish my college. I am considering to go to a flight school in the U.S. but am confused about chosing the best one since I am overseas. Hope to hear from you soon.
David, thanks for your question. This question actually prompted me to start a whole new project (more on that below) so I appreciate it!
To answer the question, “What is the best flight school?”, is about the same as asking, “What is the best airplane to fly?” A hard question to answer unless you know the mission. Every person has an individual need when choosing a flight school and there is not one easy answer for that question.
There are many options when it comes to choosing a flight school.
- Do you want a college degree?
- Do I need preparation for a professional career?
- Do I need flexible hours?
- What kind of airplane do I eventually want to fly?
- Do I need bank financing?
- What kind of airplane do I want to train in?
- Do you want or need a accelerated flight school program or would you like a smaller flight school?
In order to give you a recommendation I really need to know more information about your goals once you become a certified pilot. Not knowing this information, it is hard to give you a blank recommendation.
However, I will say that I would recommend a flight school that is governed by FAR Part 141. Part 141 refers to the federal regulations under which the school operates. I generally recommend a Part 141 flight school for international students because they are usually better prepared to deal with the security requirements to train students from foreign countries.
I have a couple of sites that I would encourage you to visit:
AOPA: How to Choose a Flight School
AvScholars: Learn how to choose a flight school
Now, my new project (work in progress…just started yesterday):
Basically offering similar services as Flight School Reviewer but with some added features such as a map where you can see where the flight schools are located, which can be important. You can then click the map marker, look at information about the flight school such as aircraft available, certificates given and then read the reviews. Like I said, work in progress. I would love it if you tried it out and let me know what features you would like to have added.
If you can give me some more information about your requirements for learning to fly, I might be able to better answer your question.
Fly (and train) Safe!
