Chicago’s Tuskegee Next gathers momentum
10 at-risk youth earn private certificates
By David Tulis
Graduates of the eight-week Tuskegee Next summer flight program for at-risk teens celebrated earning nearly a dozen private pilot certificates at Chicago’s Illinois Aviation Academy. It was the fourth year of the program founded by Steve Davis, chairman of the DuPage Airport Authority.
“We should have 10 pilots by next week,” said Executive Director Sanura Young during a break from scheduling checkrides for 10 youth ages 16 to 20. “Each and every one wants to be a pilot in some form,” she said. “They say want to be cargo pilots, U.S. Air Force fighter pilots, or commercial pilots.”
The youth program began in 2015 with eight students who coached each other and worked together as a team “to instill confidence and poise,” Davis said. “Kids that have never driven a car, can pilot an airplane, and when they get out of that airplane it is really worth it to see the joy in their eyes.”
The goal is to graduate 100 pilots by 2025 who will then be able to “literally soar into the future as pilots” or to accomplish things that might be “beyond their imagination,” Davis added.
Although the program was initially just for Chicago-area residents, Young explained that the free, fully immersive nonprofit program “ballooned nationally” in 2018 because organizers got better at getting the word out. In addition to students from Illinois, Tuskegee Next instructors recently taught students from Alabama, Pennsylvania, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The concept for success utilizes a three-tiered approach by providing role models and a clear path toward aviation careers through flight training, life skills, and educational assistance. Besides intensive flight training at DuPage, campers are exposed to aerospace education options and accompanying careers, a mentorship program that pairs professional aviators with students, and community service projects. Students also participate in EAA Young Eagles rallies and flights, ACE camps, activities at Chicago’s busy O’Hare International Airport, and other aviation adventures.
“This is our fourth year and we’re hitting our stride,” said Illinois Aviation Academy Chief Pilot Scott Malcolm. “The students all have a passion for aviation and it shows because they gave up their summer for it.”
AOPA has also recognized the importance of growing the pilot population and the association put several programs in place to ensure a robust future for aviators. The goal of AOPA’s You Can Fly High School Initiative is to help build and sustain aviation-based STEM programs and provide a quality workforce to the aviation industry. The You Can Fly program and the AOPA Air Safety Institute are funded entirely by charitable donations to the AOPA Foundation, a 501(c)(3) organization. To be a part of the solution, visit www.aopafoundation.org/donate.
Used Skyhawks a hot item
Sales are taking off for used aircraft
By Jim Moore
Industry insiders credit a strong economy and medical reform among the key factors driving one of the hottest used airplane markets many have seen in years. Prices for 40-year-old airplanes do not typically jump 20 percent in the space of a few months, but that’s exactly what has happened to Cessna Skyhawks produced between 1968 and 1976. Values for many other popular models, including newer aircraft, also are climbing fast.
Rodney Martz, a senior aviation technical specialist in AOPA’s Pilot Information Center, said the recent jump in sale prices for Skyhawks produced in the 1960s and 1970s stands out as the largest percentage increase he has seen in many years, if ever. AOPA monitors the market, and provides detailed information to members on request, through the Vref aircraft value reference service, which updates prices for used aircraft quarterly based on sales data reported by dealers.
“We talk to members every day,” Martz said. Through many years of service, Martz has never seen such a sharp increase in price for used aircraft models as the $6,000 to $10,000 increase in the price of used Skyhawks produced between 1968 and 1976 shown in the latest quarterly reports. Vref now lists retail prices up to $51,000 for a 1973 Cessna 172M with a mid-time engine—a 24-percent increase since the previous quarterly report.
“That’s the sharpest change I’ve witnessed,” Martz said. “We observed that indeed airplanes were selling for more than asking price, and they were selling in two days.”
Lapsed pilots returning to active status may well be in the market for airplanes, and Martz noted that a good, used Skyhawk has always been a coveted purchase.
ASI NEWS
Going direct-to?
Know your airspace before you do
By Machteld Smith
Here you are, ready to plan your first dual cross-country flight. You’ve been looking forward to this milestone in your flight training journey since you first soloed. The moment has finally arrived.
You follow your flight instructor’s guidance and plan the route across the chart. It’s a bit different from hopping over to the practice area—a routine etched in your mind. But you’re ready. Plotter in hand, you draw a straight line on the sectional chart from your departure point to a navaid—then to your destination point—and mark several checkpoints along the route, like your CFI instructed. She will of course review your plotted route, discuss details, and help you alter the route as needed. So, planned flight confirmed, you enter it in the GPS, activate the flight plan, and away you go. Easy.
Sometimes it can be like that. But as you progress through training you’ll realize that things can get more complicated when a temporary flight restriction (TFR) pops up or your intended route traverses special use airspace. Now you have to think about navigating around prohibited airspace and other areas through which you may not be cleared or that you wish to avoid.
The planning takes a bit longer as questions pop up about how best to make the trip. For example, can you fly through special use airspace ,or is it ever possible to traverse a TFR’s outer ring? It can be daunting for any pilot to understand today’s various airspace intricacies. But the AOPA Air Safety Institute can help.
ASI’s Know Before You Go: Navigating Today’s Airspace online course offers a practical approach to navigating basic and up to the most complex airspace in the National Airspace System. The free course explains airspace regulations and how to stay out of trouble when flying from point A to point B. You’ll be well-prepared to go once you learn what’s special about special use airspace, understand boundaries of restricted and prohibited areas, and know how to work around TFRs. The course makes it easy to become an ace at performing a preflight briefing and route planning that counts. Take the course—now you’re cleared to go fly.
Machteld Smith is an aviation technical writer for the AOPA Air Safety Institute.
Web: www.airsafetyinstitute.org/courses/knowbeforeyougo
Making better pilots
Try the new Focused Flight Review
The AOPA Air Safety Institute, in collaboration with industry partners, has introduced the Focused Flight Review, a series of ready-to-use scenarios with preflight study material and flight profiles that focus on familiar operational areas.
Built into each scenario are ways to improve fundamental stick-and-rudder skills, decision making, understanding of aircraft operating envelopes, technologies, aircraft performance capabilities, and loss-of-control avoidance.
“The Focused Flight Review is a comprehensive flight review program, designed by an ASI-led consortium of influential instructors, pilot clubs, and government agencies,” said AOPA Air Safety Institute Executive Director Richard McSpadden. “The materials were created to deal with historical problem areas and help make us all better pilots.”
The flight profiles and preflight study resources offered in the Focused Flight Review—downloadable as pdf files—include Positive Aircraft Control; Weather and CFIT (controlled flight into terrain); Fuel, Engine, and Other Systems; Instrument Proficiency; and Takeoffs, Landings, and Go-Arounds.
“It’s easy to select the flight profile that focuses on your needs from the Focused Flight Review website,” said McSpadden. “Before your flight date, share the profile with your CFI, and review the preflight materials. Then fly.”
You can share how it went by clicking the Feedback tab on the right side of the home page.
“We encourage pilots and flight instructors to let us know how we can make improvements to ensure the program remains relevant and insightful,” McSpadden said.
Pilots can use the Focused Flight Review website to find a flight school or additional flight review resources.
Web: www.aopa.org/training-and-safety/air-safety-institute/flight-review
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