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Shifting Focus: Tower Training
Entry posted by Andy Ford in ATC Training ·
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Following feedback received during and following the ATC Training Consultation, the department has been hard at work. One of the points raised during the consultation, that many of you have added your voices to since, is that as a division, we spend a lot of time in our training doing theory. Often, teaching the same thing multiple times and on topics that students should be able to learn for themselves. Some have gone as far as to say that some people expect to be spoon-fed information, like a lecture rather than mentoring. The other argument posed was that we should be spending practical mentoring sessions doing just that, practical mentoring.
Based on this feedback, we have done a complete shake-up of the S2 Training (Tower) Syllabus which is available for download in the Downloads section.
The key points of this re-thinking of our syllabus are as follows:
- A number of competencies have been designated as self-taught. In the past, these were included in practical mentoring reports, which led to some students assuming that the mentor would teach them. Now it is expected that students will have read through this information before they commence practical training - which will eventually be enforced with the introduction of the S2 moodle. More importantly, the departments stance on these competencies is that a student must study them in their own time and bring specific questions to mentoring sessions, reducing the amount of mentoring time we spend teaching these. The progress sheets in the CTS have been redesigned to remove the theory aspects.
- Giving the students a clear path for progression. The syllabus now marries up each criterion to the gradings, giving students a description of what they need to demonstrate to reach each grading. By doing this, it provides students a clear indication of what they need to do in order to advance their grading.
- Removing the possibility for individual interpretation of performance by mentors. Under the old grading system, it was largely down to mentor interpretation as to what "Test Standard" and "Satisfactory" look like. This new syllabus gives guidance to mentors to ensure that mentors are all grading from the same gradebook without personal interpretation.
- Reducing the amount of time filling out mentoring reports. Mentors are now being asked, instead of regurgitating documents, to simply link to the document in their mentoring report.
- Making better use of Sweatbox. In the past, we've been quite bad at using Sweatbox - using it purely as a heavy traffic simulator rather than training towards specific competencies. We are now actively encouraging mentors to use Sweatbox if traffic levels are too low to be productive. It is important here that mentors cover specific competencies, with defined situations for doing so, rather than just doing a free-for-all.
- Looking towards structured commencement of training. During the consultation we mentioned that we were looking to trial using Sweatbox for standardised exercises at the commencement of training, to give every student a level playing field regardless of training aerodrome. This would also allow students to practice competencies in a controlled manner, at their own pace, without the pressure of real network pilots. The competencies in the syllabus have been divided in such a way to prepare us for this trial (more on this soon!).
But, most of all, the purpose of this syllabus is to put responsibility for training into the hands of the student. If students take the time to self-study and bring their questions to practical mentoring sessions, they can expect to pass their exams quicker on average than a student of similar ability that does not, due to being prepared for the practical situations they face. Students can expect to have a theory run-through with the TGI's when they're practically ready for exam - if they can't demonstrate that they've done their reading, they won't get forwarded, simple. The department will always be there to support the students and help them succeed, don't get me wrong, but the focus is now shifting to put the responsibility of training more with the student and remove this perceived attitude that the department will spoon-feed everything that a student needs to succeed.
A final note. This syllabus is still very much evolving. We have done our best to get feedback from members, mentors and instructors alike to ensure that this is a joint effort amongst all parties. However, as the training system and VATSIM itself changes over time, we will be updating the syllabus to reflect the needs of the division. If anybody finds something that they think should be on the syllabus or something that needs updating, please raise it with us and we can have that discussion.
We are currently restructuring the Approach syllabus in the same way, which will be announced in due course.
The syllabus will be aiming to go live at 0001 local on Monday 16 April, at which time the progress sheets on the CTS will be updated for all future mentoring sessions. This is to ensure that students and mentors have sufficient time to read and raise any concerns that they may have. Note that this will not affect Heathrow, which will retain its specialised training sheets.
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