Confederation College Aviation Flight Management Program Very Popular
by Scott A. Sumner
Aviation has always been very interesting to me and it was fun to get a tour of the Confederation College Aviation Centre.
Isabella Downton, is a First Year Instructor at Confederation College. She began the position in August after graduated in the class of spring 2023.
“ Right now I have over 300 flying hours on the Cessna 172 which are brand new planes we got in November 2022. They were specifically built for us and ferried up from Kansas. The planes have advanced avionics and cost about $500,000 each.”
Each instructor at the Confederation College Aviation Flight Management program has six students in the program.The program is two years and usually the intake is 50 to 60 students.
“ As the program progresses some students find they don’t like it or are unsuccessful so the graduating class is between 20 and 40 people. The graduating students obtain a Commercial Pilots License ( CPL ) which means you can fly for money. After that you can get upgrading which are add ons to your license such as an instructor rating, which I got at a different flight school. Some get a multiple engine rating or IFR instrument ratings so you can fly into clouds.You could also get a float rating, all adding to your basic CPL.”
“The ultimate goal is to get flight hours and eventually the ATPL - Airline Transport License. You need 1500 flight hours total time in different conditions. It can take up to five years to get. Eventually you could end up to flying for say Air Canada.”
The Confederation College Aviation Flight Management program is in high demand and competitive to get in with students coming here from across Canada.
