Oz Report

What a lone instructor needs (from issue 10.203)

Support from the surrounding clubs (Oregon Hang Gliding)

http://www.oregonhanggliding.com/StrategicPlanSummary.pdf

John Matylonek <john> writes:

I have been an instructor in the Pacific Northwest for 10 years now.  I have done the best that I could do with some ideal natural resources.  My emphasis has been basic and novice instruction and promotion of hang gliding in this region.

The reality is five things must happen for a school run by one person:

1.  It must develop a professional program of instruction given the resources available.  The perception of a value must be apparent to the customer and pilot community.  We cannot sell snake oil.

2.  The program (and its cost to the customer) must be actively promoted by all the USHPA chapters within a pre-determined economic sustainable territory.  This must result in generating a minimum dollar volume of impulse and committed students.

3.  The business must sell a minimum volume of merchandise in connection with the program or the outside sales to the community.  This is necessary to subsidize the instruction program to keep prices affordable.

4.  The business must be able to pay its single employee a living annual wage for any chance of expansion.

5.  The business must be able to re-invest back into itself for upkeep, improvement and absorb setbacks (cars breaking down, gliders damaged, etc) If any one of these elements is missing, the aspiring instructor will not survive.  What specifically happens is:

1.  The instructor becomes disheartened by the actual effort, unreliability and risk of instruction.  They are overwhelmed by the work, scheduling of ideal experiences, equipment damage, or no longer feel confident they can safely teach someone - so they quit.

2.  Not enough prospective students call.  The instructor depends too heavily on the complete commitment of fewer and fewer students from too small a territory.  They are also surprised By the lack of support, petty jealousies, expectations of buddy deals from peers, excessive scrutiny and arm-chair criticism, so return to the recreational pilot community.

3.  The single instructor’s low instructional volume necessitates augmenting instructional income with equipment sales.  If students or the community do not purchase equipment, the business fails.

4.  If the business cannot pay its expenses and/or cannot pay the instructor, an instructor will, by necessity, find another job and become less available for instruction until the quality of service (availability and reliability) deteriorates to the point of becoming entirely non-viable.

5.  The program remains primitive and deteriorates till it cost too much to re-tool and/or instructor is distracted to greater sources of income.

See more at the URL above.

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