Best flight schools in canada?

Does the good weather make up for the
shortcomings, though?

Don't mind him, that's just the Colonel's way of saying that Smith Falls, Ontario has the best flight school in Canada and you should start there.

Holy edit, Batman!

Nah, the wx here sucks at least 6 months
of the year, too.

The best flight school in Canada, by far, is run by the RCAF.

Now if you are asking about who is the best instructor well there are only 3 choices, Me, Shiny Side Up , and Colonel Sanders, but I am not so sure about the other 2

But seriously, I think you are asking the wrong question. The right question is what is the best flight school for you

To answer that question you need to think about what you want.

The "wants" are delimited by how often you want to fly, how hard you want to work, and the level of convenience you desire. Think hard about that and then do your research by contacting schools and asking them what they can do for you.

Oh pooh BPF, I'm a terrible flight instructor. I don't look like one, I don't dress like one, I don't have a big watch, no bars, no white shirt and in general hate gizmos, I hate foreflight, iPads, iPhones and I don't teach anyone how to use a GPS to get around the circuit. Apparently I don't give enough praise when instructing either. Plus, I want to be paid to do it. I'm also not interested in building or collecting hours or flying for anyone's airline so that makes me unprofessional at best. I also deliver critiques like Calculon.

[quote]Oh pooh BPF, I'm a terrible flight instructor. I don't look like one, I don't dress like one, I don't have a big watch, no bars, no white shirt and in general hate gizmos, I hate foreflight, iPads, iPhones and I don't teach anyone how to use a GPS to get around the circuit. Apparently I don't give enough praise when instructing either. Plus, I want to be paid to do it. I'm also not interested in building or collecting hours or flying for anyone's airline so that makes me unprofessional at best. I also deliver critiques like Calculon.[quote]

No argument here. You have summed it up well!

I forgot to mention that I'm not very old, so I don't have any worthwhile experience. But enough about me.

While the going to the best flight schools in Canada might be a bit subjective (as BPF points out, it will be different what is best for you) Its probably more important to avoid the worst flight schools in Canada. We of course can't name names, but we can point out some alarm bells for the neophytes.

#1. Accident rates. For some reason, some schools manage to squirm out from under this very damning thing to do. Either way, if a lot of airplanes are being crashed by the school, you probably don't want to go there. Worse is if they have a lot of fatalities.

#2. Money up front. If a school asks you to put a lot of money in trust with them, its a bad sign. Maybe ask them what the interest rate you get on the deposit is. Either way, the more they want up front the worse they tend to be, and lots of the time is the sign of a sinking ship.

#3. Poor maintenance. Possibly tied to #1. This might be hard to tell from the newbie perspective, and isn't solely boiled down to how shiny the paint is. An indicator is usually how long the airplanes sit when there is trouble, booking aircraft might be another clue.

#4. High Instructor turn over. While there will almost always be some turnover at a school, you shouldn't see whole new staff every time you visit.

#5. Selling lots of Sim. You don't need 15 hours of sim before you can get into an airplane. 'nuff said.

There's more, but those would be the major issues you see with schools. Help one trim the list down quick.

And when you go to a flight school, try asking the grumpy looking guy who looks like a janitor his opinion. It just might be SSU!

Big Pistons Forever wrote:Now if you are asking about who is the best instructor well there are only 3 choices, Me, Shiny Side Up , and Colonel Sanders,

Absolutely true IF volume of posts on Avcanada = quality.

AAA aviation in Chilliwack.

Good one.

But seriously, most people couldn't care less
about good instruction. They want cheap
instruction. Shiny airplanes. Big buildings
with lots of glass and steel. Large airports.

However, I am happy to compare my students
to any others in Canada:

http://i.imgur.com/yTOzbiG.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/oDFxH.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/GEbbi.jpg

Hell, I'm happy to compare my students to any
instructor in Canada

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVXWiIrTZlg

Colonel Sanders wrote:
However, I am happy to compare my students
to any others in Canada:

Bah, by your pictures, I think you only have one student! Its always that same boy. Clearly you are underused as an instructor. I think we need to get you out of that software job and get you training foreign students or something. For the greater good. Do you prefer kids from China or India?

Either way, that post is a good advertisement for "best flight school in Canada".

"best flight school in Canada"

Although cynical, what similarly occurs to me
is "highest marks in a special needs class" or
lowest BMI in an introductory Weight Watcher's
session.

PS Three different pilots in three different
aircraft

Still, you need to get out and take new pictures and or movies. Also update your porn collection, I see Eric stole the December 98 issue of PB. As nice as Katarina is, there hasn't been an East Germany for a while.

Although cynical,

I dunno, there are some reasonable schools in Canada, or at least reasonable training to be had, but the cynical part of me says that just doesn't sell. Flight training is more about quantity than quality in the consumer's mind, so "best" is a relative term. Unfortunately most of the "better" schools that I have experienced across the country aren't around anymore, or are at least not the same in their current incarnations, so at the very least I can't say.

I wonder if there would be a market for something like is out there for restaurants and hotels where one could go around and sample flight schools and publish a "consumer's guide" on an annual basis. Be like a secret shopper, or in some cases a not so secret one.

It would be wonderful if TC simply published
their numbers for each FTU:

Number of licences issued (PPL, CPL, etc)
Average flight time of holder at time of issuance.
CADORS filed

Hard to argue with the numbers.

PS Tell the CBC about no more East Germany.
It will come as a shock to them that their
spiritualistic comrade state is gone.

I suppose if I get bored enough one of these days I should just do a new "choosing a flight school" thread. Most of that one at the top of the page is somewhat outdated. It still would be nice to have more info than some basic numbers on licenses issued though. The CADORs one poses an interesting difficulty though, since one of the things that requires a bit of research is what name the school's airplanes are registered under or to. The search engine on the site isn't great unless you know the specifics, and there are too many terms shared by schools in their names.

It would also be nice to have specific customer input though, I wonder if one could do an Angie's list of flight training....

It would be wonderful to have customer
reviews of individual flight instructors
available ("milker!" "dick!") but frankly
with 90% of flight instructors gone every
year or two, it would be quickly outdated.

The other 10% of us "lifers" are either really
good or really bad, generally. Bimodal
distribution (can I use that term here?
Would "Dolly Parton Curve" work better?)

we could make it multiple choice:


"poor personal hygiene"

"screamer"

"groper- women beware (alternatively, men beware)"

"frustrated air show pilot"

"frustrated CF18 pilot"

"unintelligible command of English/French/Cantonese (delete as applicable)"

"wants me to say 'conflicting traffic please advise'"

"talks about Vr in a 150"

"too many equations"

I can see it now, a site like yelp for flight schools.

Fifteen people that didn't get past a fam flight complaining about how terrible the place is and one friend of the instructor that never even sat in the plane giving a five star review.

Pop n Fresh wrote:I can see it now, a site like yelp for flight schools.

Fifteen people that didn't get past a fam flight complaining about how terrible the place is and one friend of the instructor that never even sat in the plane giving a five star review.

So true, its like those rate my md. You get the same guy who wrote 122 reviews for a doctor using different usernames... haha.