Kenny Keller interviews Todd Smith (Director of Aviation Programs at Madisonville Community College) about whether college is necessary to become a helicopter pilot. Todd explains that Madisonville runs helicopter and airplane pilot programs within an Associate of Applied Science degree (up through CFII), that many program costs (including flight labs) can be VA-eligible, and that attending college opens financial-aid, loan, and scholarship options and career flexibility (useful if a pilot later loses medical certification). Kenny concludes college is not strictly necessary but can be beneficial depending on career goals and financing needs.
Chapters
All right, next up, is college necessary? This is a great question and I'm going to get to it as soon as I tell you about top 10 checkride tips. Free PDF down below. Very, very handy before you go to take your checkride. I'm Kenny Keller, creator of Helicopter Online Ground School, and this question is college necessary? I'll give you my quick opinion on it. Again, these are just my opinions. I did not have any college and I just went to a part 61 course, local flight schools, got my training, became a pilot, moved on through my career, became an EMS pilot. I've done a number of different things, never needed a college degree for any of it. However, as time goes by, there are going to be more jobs that are going to probably require a college education. I understand that and the beauty of going to a college course is what I just learned. Last week I went down to Madisonville Community College in Kentucky and this community college is using hogs, our online ground school for the training there at the college for their students. And they have a professional pilot program for airplanes or helicopters. And you can go all the way through all your, all your ratings, all the way through certified flight instructor. Okay, so I have an interview that I just did a few days ago. I'll put the link down below. It's a good interview with the Director of Aviation Programs down there here with Todd Smith from Madison Madisonville Community College. I'm going to get to it right here real quick with Todd. He's going to explain to you the benefits of attending a college program for helicopter flight training.
Fantastic. Well, thank you, Kenny. It's a pleasure to have you here with us. And you're correct, our students are using Hawkes products as a core for a lot of our courses and we really love the content and it's done a great job for us.
Thank you.
I appreciate that very much. It's a real honor to have you here. The program here, Madisonville Community College, we run two programs currently, two pilot training programs, a helicopter helicopter pilot training program and also a professional airplane pilot training program. Both programs operate or exist inside of an Associates of Applied Science degree. So you effectively end up with an associate's degree and all of the certifications on the helicopter side to take you through cfii.
Nice.
Yep. And then, you know, I had this conversation with someone the other day. Traditionally when we think about aviation, you think of traditional, right? Traditional aviation pilot in airplanes, flying helicopters. But we know what the uav, UAS scene has looked like in the last several years and now we're moving into all these other adjacent commercial space flight and other sectors of the aviation industry, that's going to require talent.
Right. Which plays into the reason we're sitting here because you told me on the phone, I said, you know, I never thought about the benefits of going to the community college. And on the phone before I ever drove down here, you started listing why. And it was the, not just the pilot jobs, but if you, the fact of attending the college, you might be getting an airplane or helicopter rating, but it opens up those doors of other business parts of aviation, other areas you might want to move to where you need the degree, you need that training because you, maybe the pilot's not going to be your main job. Maybe you're going to be in sales or operations of a company or whatever.
There's or something unfortunate occurs in your life and you lose medical.
Right.
The ability to get a medical.
Right.
Right. It can no longer fly professionally.
Sure.
So yeah, you're absolutely right there. A number of, I feel a number of advantages to obtaining your ratings, learning to fly and becoming a, you know, certificated pilot inside of a collegiate program. I want to be real clear and say also though that I have a lot of experience with non collegiate programs and they can be fantastic and produce just phenomenal pilots. Absolutely. But really, especially on the helicopter side, what we know is funding and financing is often the number one barrier to entry. Every day. Right, right.
Every day we get this, I want to do it, but I don't know how or I have VA money and I don't know how to apply that or is there any scholarships or is there? And it's like for me, what I do, it's like, oh, you have to get on Google and research. I don't know, I wasn't, I wasn't able to have a good conversation. And that's why you're here, is to tell us all those benefits. Yeah.
So seeking out the pilot ratings within a degree program or at an institute of higher education, it opens up a number of options for traditional student financial aid and loans that wouldn't necessarily have been there. Going through a vocational pathway further to your point, with respect to Veterans specifically, our programs are VA eligible, so the Veterans Administration eligible.
And this is big. And this is where I was hoping you were getting ready to go because we get those calls all the time and there's so many people that have those benefits that need to use them. And now I will be able to recommend a place to go before. Never been visited to college. And that was why I was happy to come down here and get to see firsthand the benefits. And now I have a place I can recommend and I will so touch a little more on the VA and how it works, how that somebody can come here and use those benefits to get their training.
I'm always reluctant to say it'll pay for. It'll pay for because there are no guarantees from a vet's perspective. And then. And then really what it comes down to is if anyone is interested in speaking with us about the eligibility and getting an idea of how much of the program that benefits will pay for, then contact us directly and we'll provide that information. Current and it's at the moment because it does change from semester to semester, sometimes based on how we've amended curriculums or what may have actually occurred. So I'm reluctant to say it'll do because that kind of dates the content of what we're talking about here.
Right. Everything's changing. There's always things that are updating.
Yeah. A large portion, very large portion of the programs, the fees, the flight labs are eligible for Veterans Administration benefits. So it makes a huge difference.
You're earning a degree while you're there. So not only are VA benefits eligible, there are loans and scholarships that are available when you go to a college. And the other thing that he pointed out is as the world changes and you have more commercial space flight opening up, you've got the drones becoming a bigger part of the big picture. There are a lot of jobs in aviation where that college, college might be required for some other sector that you want to move into. So it's a really good video. And I never really thought about time went down. Spent three days last week in Kentucky, and this gentleman, Todd Smith, Director of Aviation Programs, explained to me why someone would want to attend their college. And he made a lot of sense. And it's a great video. Again, I'll put that link down below. So is college necessary? It's not. However, can it be a benefit? It certainly can, depending on where you're going to go with your career and what you want to do. And Todd made a good point. Having that degree. What if you have that degree and you get out and you're doing the piloting, but then you lose your medical for some reason? It could happen to anyone. You still have that aviation degree to fall back on, where you could continue to work in aviation, where piloting is not specifically your job, it's some other sector of the aviation field. So it's a great question. Is college necessary? Not necessary, but there are certain benefits to it and if that's right for you, I'd highly recommend taking that route. And if you're looking for somewhere to go, Madisonville Community College. I will put their link down below their website where you can find out more information about their college program. So hope that helps. Alright, we have a summer sale going up through the last day of September. Nope, that's not right. I'm getting tired. September 22nd, last day of summer. This sale ends 33% off any membership@helopterground.com below. Use the code Summer33 during checkout to save 33%. That's a nice chunk of money right now. Times are tough, inflation's going up. We're giving a deal to help you get back to your training. So helicopterground.com below, text or call Heather at 574-767-1797. That's our Hogs Business Line. She takes that mobile phone home with her and you can text or call her seven days a week with your questions. 574-767-1797. Also Top 10 Chick Ride Tips Chick Ride Top 10 Chick Ride Top 10 Checkride Tips Link down below free PDF alright, peace out. See you next video.
