{"id":4079,"date":"2016-11-03T05:39:40","date_gmt":"2016-11-03T12:39:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.mechadigital.net\/?p=4079"},"modified":"2021-08-26T20:37:54","modified_gmt":"2021-08-26T20:37:54","slug":"167-dont-rip-off-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/167-dont-rip-off-students\/","title":{"rendered":"#167 “Don’t Rip Off the Students”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written in 2016<\/p>\n

That\u2019s really not a great title for this article.\u00a0 It\u2019s just that I remember that quote from George DeMartini when I think of him.<\/h3>\n
\"demartini-george\"
George DeMartini<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of my friends tipped me off that George was getting ready to hang it up.\u00a0 So I dropped George an email and asked if it was true.\u00a0 He replied that it was and also muttered something about not putting up with crap any more.\u00a0 That was George!<\/h3>\n

When I was taking dual to become a Flight Instructor, George was my teacher.\u00a0 He gave me a lot of little gems during that time, but one has really stuck with me.\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t ever rip off the students\u201d, he admonished.<\/h3>\n

<\/h3>\n

Wow, was that ever good advice and I\u2019ve never forgotten it.\u00a0 You see, time is the commodity an instructor can waste and that is the number one way in which he can \u201crip off\u201d the student.\u00a0 I\u2019ll give you an example:\u00a0 I was in the pattern at a Central Oregon airport.\u00a0 We were flying our usual tight pattern, nice and close to the runway and at a fairly low altitude on downwind.\u00a0 We turned crosswind as soon as we\u2019d passed the departure end of the runway and didn\u2019t waste much downwind, turning base with no power in order to keep it tight.\u00a0 As we flew our short final, I looked down to see another plane obviously waiting at the hold short line to take the runway we were landing on.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t think much of it until we completed that landing and came around for another.\u00a0 He was still there.\u00a0 Three or four times we went around and that plane was still there, it\u2019s engine running and the CFI just yakking away while the Hobbs meter ran and the student\u2019s bill kept increasing.\u00a0 Do you get my point?\u00a0 That student was being ripped off.\u00a0 Another way I see students being ripped off is during much tailwheel training, when so much importance is placed on their ability to stop. Every landing is to a stop, with a taxi back for the next takeoff.\u00a0 I get asked all the time why we do so few of those \u201cland and taxi back\u201d maneuvers, preferring the \u201ctouch and go\u201d.\u00a0 I reply that a chimp can be taught to stop\u2026. I just don\u2019t place as much importance on it as most Acme instructors do.<\/h3>\n
\"copy-of-george-in-clouds\"
George forms up with my glider for a photo pass after towing me to altitude in the Pawnee tow plane.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If there is an operation which doesn\u2019t require much practice, to spend a lot of our time practicing is to rip off the guy paying the bill.\u00a0 Maybe that\u2019s why in a Tailwheel Endorsement course or a Master Class, I often introduce a maneuver but don\u2019t spend a lot of time allowing the applicant to practice it.\u00a0 I want him to practice it on his own time with whatever airplane is available to him, but not while he\u2019s paying for the course he\u2019s taking with me.\u00a0 Yup, ol\u2019 George gave me some very good advice back then.\u00a0 He was the guy who invented the \u201cratcheting elevator\u201d, he was the guy who first questioned the practice of teaching to \u201cminimum standards\u201d, but more importantly, he was the guy who made me realize how important it is not to rip off the students.<\/h3>\n

<\/h3>\n

Oh, and if you see George, don\u2019t say anything about this article.\u00a0 George doesn\u2019t like publicity.<\/h3>\n

<\/h3>\n

As I said in \u201cBrian\u2019s Flying Book\u201d, thanks, George!<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“He was the guy who invented the \u201cratcheting elevator\u201d, he was the guy who first questioned the practice of teaching to \u201cminimum standards\u201d, but more importantly, he was the guy who made me realize how important it is not to rip off the students.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4082,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[35,67,174],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4079"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}