Source: Bill Gross, 785-826-2970, bgross@k-state.edu
News release prepared by: Sheila Ellis, 785-532-6415, media@k-state.edu
Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2007
K-STATE AT SALINA AVIATION STUDENTS GAIN EXPERIENCE AS CO-PILOTS ON UNIVERSITY FLIGHTS
SALINA -- When it comes to training future pilots, Kansas State University at Salina offers a high-flying advantage: the opportunity for students to gain valuable experience by flying real flights with passengers and providing the university with real aviation services.
"Other schools own private planes but they hire a professional crew to fly them. At K-State, the job falls to aviation faculty and students," said Bill Gross, professor of aviation at K-State at Salina and the university's chief pilot. "To my knowledge, no other school has that resource. We are the only university that uses its advanced students as co-pilots for trips on university-related business."
Gross, who has been an aviation professor for more than 20 years, said in order for students to fly on these trips they must first have a commercial pilot's certification with multiengine and instrument ratings, complete a class about the aircraft systems, and complete a class about crew resource management. Gross and three other K-State at Salina aviation faculty members, all advanced pilots, serve as pilots on the trips.
Dennis Kuhlman, dean of K-State at Salina, said the transportation program helps the university in producing highly rated, qualified professional pilots who are prepared to assume entry-level airline or corporate pilot positions.
"Through the transportation program, the university family provides the destinations, timetables and customer demands needed to complete a corporate training environment," Kuhlman said. "It is the goal of K-State at Salina to have each of our student pilots graduate with a minimum of 20 hours of flight time in our corporate level aircraft: our King Air and Citation jets."
The jets are just part of K-State's more than 30-plane training fleet, which also includes a helicopter.
The trips can take students around the Big 12 Conference, of which K-State is a member, to some of the nation's biggest cities. But the students, Gross said, aren't just along for the ride.
"The students help prepare the airplane for the trip, help with weight and balance calculations, flight planning, gathering the correct charges for the flight, reading the check list, verifying the pilot has correct frequencies and altitudes and making the call outs of those items," Gross said.
"The students also fly the airplane on any leg of a trip where there are no passengers, with the pilot acting as their co-pilot," he said.
While in the cockpit, students are gaining valuable experience for their future careers in aviation, Gross said. The flight hours they accumulate are used toward the various professional certifications and licensing requirements they need to become airline or corporate pilots. They gain operating experience in a high performance aircraft and in a high altitude environment. They also get experience flying in and out of high density airports.
The aviation transportation service -- used only for official university business -- is not free, Kuhlman said.
"The flight expenses associated with the operation of the aircraft are paid by the unit requesting the trip, such as the athletic department for coaches' recruiting trips," Kuhlman said. "The student co-pilots also pay a fee for the flight lab which is used to support the extra training they receive, too."
But the trips do have some definite advantages. As a student co-pilot, Chase Krien, senior in professional pilot, Bird City, has found himself sitting just a few feet away from some of K-State's biggest names -- like football coach Ron Prince, basketball coach Frank Martin and university President Jon Wefald, as well as other VIPs and dignitaries.
One perk of the co-pilot job is getting to visit different parts of the country, Krien said. Last spring break he got to fly up and down the East Coast and visit local attractions during stops. Students often get to visit cities like Washington, D.C., Chicago, Miami, Los Angeles and all points in between, Gross said.
The trips work on a rotation for qualified aviation students, said Kendal Brown, senior in professional pilot, Ponca City, Okla. Most of the time, students don't know who they will fly until it is time to escort the passengers onto the jet.
"It makes it pretty adventurous because you never know who you are going to fly," Brown said.
The frequency of the trips is hard to plan, he said. "The hard part is Big 12 basketball, volleyball and football all overlap -- so they hit all of us at once," he said. "When coaches are recruiting, they are on the run, too."
The trips give students invaluable experience, Brown said.
"It is different from just flying over Salina," he said. "We go out and train every day, but we actually get to use a lot more of what we learn and put it to more practical use through these trips."
On a normal practice day, aviation students don't get to clear more than 5,000 feet. But when flying for the university, they gain experience flying at over 30,000 feet to 35,000 feet in the air.
Janelle Baron, junior in professional pilot, Monument, Colo., said she is currently applying to join the Navy's aviation program. Flying for the university helped her determine what career path in aviation she wanted, she said. "This program is really neat because we get to show people what we do here at K-State at Salina," she said. "We get to meet people from all walks of life and learn different aspects of life."