To all the flight instructors out there, what are the pro's and con's of presenting your pgi's off printed paper versus from a laptop??

Just getting ready for my Class 4 test and trying to decide if I want to go print all 24 exercises and throw in all in a thick binder or leave it all on my USB (which is backed up X2)

The school I hope to teach at doesn't have a projector in the briefing rooms so the laptop would just be for me to reference.

Besides the obvious like power outages, laptop crashes and losing a USB stick, anyone have any practical preferences over one to another?

Thanks!

From a cost/benefit standpoint, I don't see
that the laptop is worth it. You have to lug
it around. Most people like to plug them in,
so you have to futz with the power cord.
Then, you have to make sure there's a table
or desk or something nearby to support it
so you can look at it while you present the
PGI. Are you planning to draw anything on
the board while you present your PGI, or
just have the student look at the laptop
screen while you advance the powerpoint
slides?

I am worried by this:

print all 24 exercises and throw in all in a thick binder

Your PGI for each lesson should fit on one
8.5x11 piece of paper. Ok, you can use both
sides for the long ones.

There are many inexperienced class 1 instructors
out there, that coach their class 4 candidates to
include everything under the sun in their PGI, to
try to appease TC, whom they fear greatly.

That produces poor PGI for the student - my father
refers to this as "death by briefing". You do not want
to brief a student for 2 hrs for steep turns, for example.
If you cannot do PGI for steep turns in 15 minutes,
that is a failure, IMHO.

Look at the flight test guide 5537E:

http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/civilaviation/p ... l-4278.htm

Fail — All
1.Teaching Competency:
e.Demonstrates a lack of control of the lesson and a use of time that is limited to the point of being ineffective;

So, if your class 1 is telling you to make 100 page
PGI that takes 2 hrs to present, well, he's setting
you up for failure. I regularly am asked to pick up
the pieces after that kind of training.

Please remember that not all of your students will
have a Nobel Prize or even a PhD in physics, or even
a photographic memory. Most of them will be hamburger.

They will remember perhaps 2 or 3 things from the PGI,
so choose them carefully. Don't tell the poor student all
178 things that you know about an exercise. You should
keep the vast majority of your knowledge about an exercise
in your "back pocket", ready to present to an advanced
student whom asks difficult questions. In that respect,
good PGI is like an iceberg.

Try to create good PGI. I could do on to define it, but
remember, Death By Briefing. Enough for now.

Good PGI is like an iceberg ! That is good metaphor, but just to be an ass, you could compare the student to...guess !

PGI is what passes or fails the flight instructor
flight test, oddly enough. Everyone knows what
bad PGI looks like:



Using as few words as possible, tell me what
defines good PGI.

There seems to be a problem with PGI's and the way that they are presented. Many Instructors are nor clear on what a PGI is and when it's supposed to be delivered. They also may not know the difference between a Pre-Flight Briefing and a PGI or they may mix them around.

If you look at the Flight Instructor Guide, you will see that for each lesson, they give you this:

Essential Background Knowledge

The FIG says that Essential Background Knowledge is "the minimum knowledge required for the student to benefit fully from the air instruction. One of your obligations as an instructor is to make sure that students complete all the pertinent ground instruction before beginning air instruction"

Then, they go on and give you a huge list of items that you are supposed to cover on the ground. I would say this sounds more like Ground School to me... so there you go, you now have a huge thick binder and the poor students have to seat in front of a whiteboard for hours as you teach them everything they need to know.

I thought that the whole point of the PGI was to show the student HOW the flight exercise is to be done, not a lengthy Ground School session on many aspects that you won't even cover when you go up and teach the exercise.

So I have to agree with CS, but not sure what TC likes anymore. I wonder if you could pass your initial Class 4 ride delivering a 15-minute PGI that's one page long.

I have a nice rubberized binder with plastic sheet holders for every page. Keeps it neat and clean. Most lessons are a page or less. After delivering them several times now I only crack the binder for a second before the lesson to write the outline on the board.

I have an ipad, but don't use it. I just like the tangibility of the binder and a whiteboard for the lessons. Sometimes the simplest way is the best. More emphasis on the material itself, and it's easier to build the procedures.

I wonder if you could pass your initial Class 4 ride delivering a 15-minute PGI that's one page long

All my class 4's do!

Excellent point about learning the difference between:

- groundschool
- PGI
- pre-flight briefing

New class 4's need to learn the difference. Their junior
class 1 instructors teach them that PGI is groundschool,
which is simply wrong.

PGI is the information the student needs to know, to
perform the exercise in the airplane, in the air. This
is very practical stuff. If you find yourself teaching
Special Relativity during PGI, you have probably wandered
off into groundschool.

For example, steep turn PGI:

-- cut --

Ask the student if he read the chapter in the FTM (readiness).
Ask him what a steep turn is (developmental, readiness).
Ask him WHY he needs to learn to do a steep turn (motivation).

Open up FTM to chapter on steep turns.

Tell him how to do a steep turn: lookout, roll past
30 degrees of bank, add power, pull, neutralize at
45, check ball, maintain lookout.

Ask him how to do a steep turn. He should parrot
back what you just told him.

Safety. Questions.

-- cut --

If you can't do the above in 15 minutes, there is
no hope for you. Try to remember that the student
will not remember the contents of a 2 hour briefing.

As an instructor, pretend that the student is going
to charge you $10 for every word that you say during
the PGI. So, make them good ones.

No Death By Briefing.

If this makes me a Bad Man, so be it

PS PGI is all about efficiently and effectively applying
the Learning Factors in the FIG:

http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/civilaviation/p ... s-5483.htm

(a) READINESS — Ensure students are mentally, physically and emotionally ready to learn.

(b) PRIMACY — Present new knowledge or skills correctly the first time. (Teach it right the first time.)

(c) RELATIONSHIP — Present lessons in the logical sequence of known to unknown, simple to complex, easy to difficult.

(d) EXERCISE — Ensure students are engaged in meaningful activity.

(e) INTENSITY — Use dramatic, realistic or unexpected things, as they are long remembered.

(f) EFFECT — Ensure students gain a feeling of satisfaction from having taken part in a lesson.

(g) RECENCY — Summarize and practise the important points at the end of each lesson, as last things learned and practised will be remembered longest.

8. READINESS — Ensure students are mentally, physically and emotionally ready to learn.

If you apply the FIG Learning Factors, you will pass
the Flight Instructor Flight Test. If you do not, you
will not.

Colonel Sanders wrote:

I wonder if you could pass your initial Class 4 ride delivering a 15-minute PGI that's one page long

All my class 4's do!

Excellent point about learning the difference between:

- groundschool
- PGI
- pre-flight briefing

New class 4's need to learn the difference. Their junior
class 1 instructors teach them that PGI is groundschool,
which is simply wrong.

PGI is the information the student needs to know, to
perform the exercise in the airplane, in the air. This
is very practical stuff. If you find yourself teaching
Special Relativity during PGI, you have probably wandered
off into groundschool.

For example, steep turn PGI:

-- cut --

Ask the student if he read the chapter in the FTM (readiness).
Ask him what a steep turn is (developmental, readiness).
Ask him WHY he needs to learn to do a steep turn (motivation).

Open up FTM to chapter on steep turns.

Tell him how to do a steep turn: lookout, roll past
30 degrees of bank, add power, pull, neutralize at
45, check ball, maintain lookout.

Ask him how to do a steep turn. He should parrot
back what you just told him.

Safety. Questions.

-- cut --

If you can't do the above in 15 minutes, there is
no hope for you. Try to remember that the student
will not remember the contents of a 2 hour briefing.

As an instructor, pretend that the student is going
to charge you $10 for every word that you say during
the PGI. So, make them good ones.

No Death By Briefing.

If this makes me a Bad Man, so be it

PS PGI is all about efficiently and effectively applying
the Learning Factors in the FIG:

http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/civilaviation/p ... s-5483.htm

(a) READINESS — Ensure students are mentally, physically and emotionally ready to learn.

(b) PRIMACY — Present new knowledge or skills correctly the first time. (Teach it right the first time.)

(c) RELATIONSHIP — Present lessons in the logical sequence of known to unknown, simple to complex, easy to difficult.

(d) EXERCISE — Ensure students are engaged in meaningful activity.

(e) INTENSITY — Use dramatic, realistic or unexpected things, as they are long remembered.

(f) EFFECT — Ensure students gain a feeling of satisfaction from having taken part in a lesson.

(g) RECENCY — Summarize and practise the important points at the end of each lesson, as last things learned and practised will be remembered longest.

8. READINESS — Ensure students are mentally, physically and emotionally ready to learn.

If you apply the FIG Learning Factors, you will pass
the Flight Instructor Flight Test. If you do not, you
will not.

I dunno, this doesn't look like you fit it all on one sheet of paper.

For example, steep turn PGI:

-- cut --

Ask the student if he read the chapter in the FTM (readiness).
Ask him what a steep turn is (developmental, readiness).
Ask him WHY he needs to learn to do a steep turn (motivation).

Open up FTM to chapter on steep turns.

Tell him how to do a steep turn: lookout, roll past
30 degrees of bank, add power, pull, neutralize at
45, check ball, maintain lookout.

Ask him how to do a steep turn. He should parrot
back what you just told him.

Safety. Questions.

-- cut --

uh, one page?

You're assuming that the new CPLs will have graduated from crayons.

I'm just kidding you man, second on the no "death by briefing" bit. Speaking with someone from TC the other day they complained about the death by briefing technique that seems so prevalent in new class fours these days, but apparently there's nothing in the flight test guide that says you can penalize them for it, so it persists. Of course I brought up the idea that if the inspectors themselves don't like it, why don't we penalize it? That made everyone uncomfortable though. Definitely there needs to be change.

apparently there's nothing in the flight test guide that says you can penalize them for it

I am astonished that the TC Inspectors aren't
aware of this (see above):

Look at the flight test guide 5537E:

Fail — All
1.Teaching Competency:
e.Demonstrates a lack of control of the lesson and a use of time that is limited to the point of being ineffective;

The flight test guide is quite clear that the
"Death By Briefing" PGI technique is a fail.

Instructors badly need to learn that they
must learn to prioritize. What information
does a student absolutely need to know, to
perform the flight exercise? Well:

- what we are doing to do in the airplane
- how we make the airplane do that
- safety

During a PGI, if an instructor is not telling
the student what he needs to do with the
flight controls to perform the maneuver, OR
he does not have a model airplane in his
hand, showing the maneuver, he should
shut up immediately because he is confusing
the student with unnecessary crap.

What is missing from PGI today, is prioritization.
It is considered without cost, to toss in everything
and the kitchen sink into the PGI.

This is madness. No one wants to suffer through
a two hour PGI. No one will remember what was
said during a two hour PGI. Two hour PGI is
completely useless. That's reality.

Colonel Sanders wrote:

apparently there's nothing in the flight test guide that says you can penalize them for it

I am astonished that the TC Inspectors aren't
aware of this (see above):

Look at the flight test guide 5537E:

Fail — All
1.Teaching Competency:
e.Demonstrates a lack of control of the lesson and a use of time that is limited to the point of being ineffective;

The flight test guide is quite clear that the
"Death By Briefing" PGI technique is a fail.

I don't think its that clear, or we wouldn't have this problem. After in the context of 1.e. in most cases the PGI is well controlled by the new class 4, and the entire PGI won't be considered entirely ineffective if they get in all the stuff required. I'll even admit that some of the death by briefings I've gotten that some of the instructors did cover everything (which seems to take priority - I keep hearing from some new class 4s that their class one stressed that absolutely nothing may be missed. It also doesn't specify length of PGI as one of the items under 1 to 20 as delivering it in a timely manner. Also of note there is no weighting of any particular error. In terms of teaching proficiency it would be nice to know how items a) to i) are weighted, its been my discovery that with examiners that they aren't all equal, and TC in particular seems to have specific items they feel are more important than others. As it is the above e) isn't specific enough apparently.

I keep hearing from some new class 4s that their class one stressed that absolutely nothing may be missed

That's sad, because they are being taught
ineffective PGI. I pity their students. The
important points are washed away in a sea
of inessentials, because their junior class 1
instructors live in fear of TC. And the new
class 4 instructors, as they gain experience,
are sure to develop contempt for PGI, which
is not good.

Looking at TP 5537E, the popular "Death by
Briefing" technique is an outright fail on two
counts:

c. Neglects the instructional application of essential background knowledge required for the task or exercise being taught;

e. Demonstrates a lack of control of the lesson and a use of time that is limited to the point of being ineffective

The people who wrote that in TP 5537E and I
are on the same page. The TC Inspectors in
the regions, who demand a 2 hour "Death By
Briefing" PGI are not.

This fear of TC, combined with an inability to
prioritize - one of the most important skills a
pilot possesses - is also behind the famous
50 page FTU checklist. Again, there is seen
to be "no cost" to throwing everything including
the kitchen sink into it.

If nothing else, FTU's are failing badly, in that
they do not teach pilots to prioritize, and focus
on what's important. You know - use your brain.

The brain is the most effective piece of safety
equipment ever invented. It's a shame when
people don't use it.

A small point.

I get the feeling that PGI is something that new
flight instructors dread, for many reasons. It's
something that instructors feel they have to do
to keep TC happy. If it wasn't for TC insisting
that they do PGI, they probably wouldn't do it
at all, because it's such an ineffective waste of
time - at least, it is, the way they were taught
to do it. PGI is what's going to fail them on
the flight test.

I am horrified by this. This is so completely wrong.

PGI is really important, because it determines
how well the student is going to perform in
the airplane. Ever wonder why students take
100 hrs to get a PPL?

I do a lot of advanced flight training, teaching
people to do some pretty difficult stuff, often
on some very challenging airplanes. These
airplanes are often very expensive to operate
and as such, the student must be very well
prepared to operate them.

This is simply not possible, without effective
PGI. Effective PGI is an incredibly important
and essential tool of an efficient flight instructor.

Let's say I am going to teach someone tailwheel
or formation flying - some basic skills. However
there is no chapter in the FTU for these skills, so
I tell them to read the corresponding sections of:

http://www.pittspecials.com/articles.html

That comprises their self-taught ground school
on the subject. When they show up, I ask them
if they read the article I wrote. I ask them a few
questions about it, to ensure that they understood
it and to refresh their memory on the important
points. I tell them specifically what we are going
to do in the airplane, and how they are going to
do that. I then ask them to parrot back to me
what I just told them. Safety. Questions.

Does that sound familiar? Of course it does - it's
effective PGI, which should take no longer than
15 minutes, because they have already read
the corresponding ground school material, which
for ab initio training is the next chapter in the FTM.

PGI is NOT ground school. PGI builds upon ground
school. It's when you tell the student how to fly
the airplane, to make it perform the maneuver.

This is really simple. This is really important.

If a student has not bothered to read the couple
of pages you have previously assigned him, he
has failed the Readiness test, just as if he had
shown up drunk for the flight. Send him home,
because he's not serious about learning to fly.

Please don't confuse a flight school with a day
care for troubled children.

The people who wrote that in TP 5537E and I
are on the same page. The TC Inspectors in
the regions, who demand a 2 hour "Death By
Briefing" PGI are not.

I would say that its less that they demand it, but rather that they allow it. Just to be clear, you and I are on the same page with this, but I am wanting to find why others aren't, in particular the people doing the examinations. Personally I don't feel TP 5537E is specific enough to guide them, or that they feel its specific enough in that regard to enforce it.

I get the feeling that PGI is something that new
flight instructors dread, for many reasons. It's
something that instructors feel they have to do
to keep TC happy. If it wasn't for TC insisting
that they do PGI, they probably wouldn't do it
at all, because it's such an ineffective waste of
time - at least, it is, the way they were taught
to do it.

The PGI is also something that many new instructors aren't signing on to do. They often have the perception its all going to be about the flying excersises, after all that's what people get into flying for, airplane time, not classroom time. Getting across the point that ground time is important is very difficult to instructors, that's not logbooking hours after all. Consequently many view that the PGI work as something to "get through". What we end up with is many class ones out there are teaching how to get through it on the test, and many instructors just want to put in that to again just get through. Willing participants.

I've had some applicants brag that they completed their instructor rating with the minimum ammount of ground time required. In all cases it shows.

Please don't confuse a flight school with a day
care for troubled children.

Heh, its easy to see why its often confused.

The PGI is also something that many new instructors aren't signing on to do

Quite true - that's why many pilots struggle
with the instructor rating. It's the first licence
or rating, that isn't about them flying the airplane.

Thinking about it, what bothers me about this,
is the junior class 1's intentionally teaching such
bad PGI. They know it's bad, but to appease TC,
they're doing a bad job with their class 4 instructors.

This is not ethical or moral - intentionally doing a
bad thing, to please the paperpushers, whom you
fear more than life itself.

There is something terribly wrong with this.

Many people, including avionics techs in Winnipeg,
screech and honk at me, because I have been in
aviation a long time, and won't do something bad
to please the paperpushers. This makes me a
VERY BAD MAN. So be it.

Thinking about it, what bothers me about this,
is the junior class 1's intentionally teaching such
bad PGI. They know it's bad, but to appease TC,
they're doing a bad job with their class 4 instructors.

I'm not so sure that appeasing TC is the goal though. TC I've found is also unhappy with the current set up, but for some reason don't feel that they can change it, so there is enough of the blame to share. Class ones out there (and some not so junior) have been consumed by their own BS in a lot of regards, and no one's done anything to put a stop to it. In many cases its because the whole FTU set up becomes so incessed, it continues to inbreed its own weakness. That there also might be a few very corruptible examiners hasn't helped the process.

As a result the PGI has taken on a life of its own, that in the flight school world has become for some about some irrelevant ideas to real life. The most common thing I see that a lot of other class ones are stressing is that absolutely nothing can be missed in the PGI as the ultimate goal, everything else secondary, and certainly time consumed being last concern. Like many things this is obviously something that has just been snowballing for a long time, sort of like an attic full of junk, no one has thought to reorganize or revise or even remove some of the old stuff. I've seen sort of this work multiple times - the class one clearly felt that a lot of items that their class four needed to be kept.

Thinking farther along this line of thought, one of the things I think as an instructor one has to be careful with is even when one gains experience, you have to be disciplined to keep stuff like your PGI lean and in fighting shape. Its really tempting to fatten them up whenever you gain more experience and more knowledge. This is what I feel is maybe behind the "death by briefing" is where a class 1 - who possibly no longer conducts ab initio (or does the PGIs associated with them) now gives in to their tendancy to press all their knowledge (and in many cases BS) into their new class fours. Some of this is maybe well intentioned, some not so much so. I can distinctly remember that one of the class ones I worked with when I was doing my own rating way back when, wasn't very good and full of a lot of BS. You got to have a good filter for this sort of stuff, and a lot of people don't.

The point being that some whom have advanced in the instructing world, may have let their game slide, get a little fat so to speak. Some maybe let it fatten up a lot. After all, class ones only get checked in on once every four years. Personally I still do a fair ammount of ab initio (against my better judgement) its useful to keep in mind the needs of a new student which sometimes are forgotten by those whom haven't been one for a long time.

Secret joy. Knowing what one knows now, being on the recieveing end of a good PGI is somewhat of a delight when one gets to recieve dual instruction, which for someone like me is somewhat of a rarity.

class ones are stressing is that absolutely nothing can be missed in the PGI as the ultimate goal, everything else secondary, and certainly time consumed being last concern

This is bad PGI. I really would like to hear from
some junior class 1 instructors here, as to how
they justify intentionally teaching such bad technique,
that doesn't do either the instructor or the poor
students any favours.

I would hope that a senior class 1 instructor (eg
held a class 1 for over 10 years) would not buy
into this obviously incorrect nonsense. I would
hope that someone who had actively been a
class 1 instructor for over a decade would have
the experience and confidence to not participate
in such a clusterf__k.

Its really tempting to fatten them up whenever you gain more experience and more knowledge

This is incredibly wrong. As a mathematician,
engineer, programmer and flight instructor, I
have learned to be a minimalist. Less is more.
The most elegant solutions are always the
simplest:



Compare that breathtaking elegance to this
pencil sharpener, which I suspect was designed
by a junior class 1 flight instructor:



PGI is NOT a brain dump of everything you know
on a subject. Anyone that doesn't understand this
simple fact, should not be teaching anything to
anybody.

Colonel Sanders wrote:I would hope that a senior class 1 instructor (eg
held a class 1 for over 10 years) would not buy
into this obviously incorrect nonsense. I would
hope that someone who had actively been a
class 1 instructor for over a decade would have
the experience and confidence to not participate
in such a clusterf__k.

I wouldn't count on it. In fact I would speculate that the longer one is a class 1, the more they have to work hard to keep their game in good shape. You can't rest on your laurels as it were.

Its really tempting to fatten them up whenever you gain more experience and more knowledge

This is incredibly wrong. As a mathematician,
engineer, programmer and flight instructor, I
have learned to be a minimalist. Less is more.
The most elegant solutions are always the
simplest:

I'm not sure about programmers and mathematicians, but I've had to put a fair ammount of engineers' plans into action to tell you that you're probably the odd man out here. You're right that said tendancy is wrong, but I would speculate that it is within human nature to fatten things up and make them unnecessarily complicated hence why we have bloated bureaucracies, daytime soaps, Windows and the CARS. Surely you've heard the rule of British engineering? Where there is a way, there is also a harder way.

I've had to put a fair amount of engineers' plans into action to tell you that you're probably the odd man out here

Could be, but one of my defining personality
characteristics is that I've never given a f__k
what anyone else thought.

I remember when I was working at cisco, I
was horrified that all the big brains were designing
a ring protocol by running a sim, and when it
broke, adding a patch. Their idea, I guess, was
to empirically patch their network protocol
until it was "good enough".

Similarly, when I was working on HFR, there
was a horrible problem with the network protocol
used to communicate between the processors
inside the Huge Frikken Router. It simply could
not pass the regression tests. Patch after patch
was applied, and the managers believe that they
were just one patch away from perfection.

They were putting lipstick on a pig. What I did,
was design from scratch, a mathematically
provably correct network protocol. To do this,
it had to be kept as simple as possible. But I
did it. The theorem was a little long, but it had
no flaws.

The managers were enraged at me because I
ignored them, and did the right thing. They all
got fired eventually, and my network protocol
is still running on the core routers of the internet,
after all these years:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrier_Routing_System

Now, I'm probably not very bright compared to
the average class 1 instructor, whom is probably
a towering intellect compared to little old me.

But I know that less is more.

Colonel Sanders wrote:

I've had to put a fair amount of engineers' plans into action to tell you that you're probably the odd man out here

Could be, but one of my defining personality
characteristics is that I've never given a f__k
what anyone else thought.

It sort of does when its affecting what we have to deal with on a daily basis. For example: I have problems finding new instructors currently because of the way other people think. This makes my life unnecessarily difficult sometimes so I have a vested interest in changing the way they think, or at least changing the way they do.

Also I was merely pointing out that "engineer" is not necessarily a synonym for "minimalist". If you care.

But I know that less is more.

You know that and I know that, the problem being that not many others know that. Look under the hood of a Land Rover, or the maintenance instructions of a BMW motorcycle for evidence.

Very interesting topic....As a Class 4 myself, I've literally just finished going through the paces and can comment on the matter since it's fresh in my head. I've had class 1's on both sides of the spectrum. 1 guy was noticeably younger than the 2nd, but the younger guy made sure no stone was left unturned. He focused entirely on the PGI, and forced me into "death by briefing." If i didn't mention anything that could be found in ASA's "Advanced Pilots Manual", I was chewed out for not mentioning it, and thus, am showing my incompetence on the subject. Eventually I switched Class 1's because of the fact that I didn't agree with his teaching methods, but by the end of my period with him, I had 3-4 page PGI's on subject like turns. I hated the size of them, and my PGI's carried on way too long as a result. At the same time, this guy thought i should be able to explain turns in 15 minutes and give out all the details I hadn't mentioned the last time I PGI'd the topic. Personally, I think the logic behind the "death by briefing" theory comes 2-fold, intentional or not.

A) It forces a prospective class 4 to pull out the books, and learn/understand a topic they otherwise wouldn't have seen before. I can't count on both hands and feet the amount of extra information I learned about during my training because of this mentality.
B) Its a huge money grab. We all know that instructors get payed shi1t...But at the same time doesn't justify making a student sweat his nuts off for an hour and a half because his Class 1 wants to make some extra coin without having to go out in the cold. Something about my first class 1 that makes me think he enjoyed seeing my squirm, but at the same time make as much money as he can in a briefing room.

By the end of the day, I learned a lot from one guy...both what to do, and what not to do. I also learned a lot of valuable lessons from the other guy. But we all have to remember, we as class 4's aren't completely incompetent. We have enough knowledge in our back pocket to atleast tell when things are going the way they should, and when you have a Class 1 thats making a feeble to pack his bank account. We as Class 4's should take it upon ourselves to look into all of this, and decide if you are getting the correct training, and if not, fix it. I would be inclined to say this "death by briefing" is as much of a class 4 created problem as a class 1

But we all have to remember, we as class 4's aren't completely incompetent. We have enough knowledge in our back pocket to atleast tell when things are going the way they should, and when you have a Class 1 thats making a feeble to pack his bank account. We as Class 4's should take it upon ourselves to look into all of this, and decide if you are getting the correct training, and if not, fix it. I would be inclined to say this "death by briefing" is as much of a class 4 created problem as a class 1

Very true. One of the things we continually see all the way through flight training is how bad practitioners succeed despite themselves. New instructor Acolytes keep going to some of these guys and many of the same priorities that people shop for every other type of flight training applies. Speed, Price and Convinience are valued far higher than quality, but with instructor rating we also have the direct promise of employment afterwards, so a new instructor student is way more likely to stick it out with a bad class one who offers employment than seek a good one who may not. This puts the new class four in a very bad spot, potentially to be continually corrupted by the mentorship of a bad class one, and likely such class ones can keep things going that way.

Death by briefing it should also be noted is how many new instructors start out when first developing their PGIs I find. Its rare to have a new instructor student not do enough, but rather most go way overboard if left to their own devices. Some will revert to this tendancy when they get into the actual act of instructing - this I've seen in action. If left unrectified we could end up with a heavily fattened up PGI technique by the time someone gets to the class 1 stage, which will then be passed on. Again this is not helped when the instructor has monetary incentive to increase the length of their PGIs.

Death by briefing it should also be noted is how many new instructors start out when first developing their PGIs I find. Its rare to have a new instructor student not do enough, but rather most go way overboard if left to their own devices. Some will revert to this tendancy when they get into the actual act of instructing - this I've seen in action. If left unrectified we could end up with a heavily fattened up PGI technique by the time someone gets to the class 1 stage, which will then be passed on. Again this is not helped when the instructor has monetary incentive to increase the length of their PGIs.

I couldn't agree more. But my scenario was a bit different. When I started, I wasn't promised a job at the end. The club I did my class 4 with had 2 class 1's, I picked the one I wanted, but later went on vacation for 3 months. Now I was stuck with the other guy. I hated his teaching methods, told me to read cover to cover the Advanced Pilots Manual, and come back with more complete PGI's...keeping in mind I was a brand new student at this time. I go in, reteach the lesson, he tells me I missed X,Y, and Z, redo it, and then have me reteach it.

While I'd like to think this guy was simply making me dig very deep into the concepts to fully understand it, I am more inclined to believe he needed a new hot tub. It was only after I did certain lessons 3-4 times each, only to still be told I'm missing concepts that I realized I wasn't making any headway and switched back to the original instructor when he got back....I was licensed 2 months after the switch.

So in retrospect, I was an idiot. I seen that this guy was clearly scamming me for my money and masking it under a "you don't know nearly enough information yet" concept....yet I did nothing. I could have gone to another club, I could have brought the issue up with the CFI, I could have done a lot of things. So a combination of young, inexperienced class 1's, sh1t pay, narcissism, and vulnerable class 4's...this is exactly where this "death by briefing" concept has sprung up.