Pilot Selection

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academyquestions

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Good morning everyone! I'm a high school student aspiring to get into the Academy or ROTC to become a pilot. What factors go into pilot selection in the Academy? Is it the same as ROTC? Thank you!
 
academyquestions said:
Good morning everyone! I'm a high school student aspiring to get into the Academy or ROTC to become a pilot. What factors go into pilot selection in the Academy? Is it the same as ROTC? Thank you!
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I don't know too much about this exact subject, but I also am aspiring to be a pilot and will be attending USAFA this summer. Attending USAFA gives you the best statistical chance of becoming a pilot compared to ROTC or OTS, about half of the graduating class has a pilot slot. Pretty much, if you want to be a pilot at USAFA, you will be a pilot. You have to be medically qualified (Different than your initial DoDMERB exam for USAFA) and I believe the whole process of being pilot qualified is started in your junior or senior year. You will know if you have a pilot slot before you graduate.
 
academyquestions said:
Good morning everyone! I'm a high school student aspiring to get into the Academy or ROTC to become a pilot. What factors go into pilot selection in the Academy? Is it the same as ROTC? Thank you!
Click to expand...
From what I heard, the AFA gets 50% of all pilot slots available for all commissioning sources, while ROTC and OTS each split the remaining 50% of pilot slots. I even heard of some 23ers who received pilot slots while having an incredibly low class rank / PCSM scores. I'd say ROTC is a much easier time during your college years, but if you really want to become a pilot, AFA is your best shot.
 
Based on class rank and Pilot Candidate Selection Method (PCSM) which is a combination of your performance in the rated section of the Air Force Officer Qualifying Test (AFOQT, think SAT type test), your performance on the Test of Basic Aviation Skills (TBAS, you can look it up) and your logged flying hours up to 41 hours.
 
To be clear, you will go to USAFA or ROTC to become an officer, first. Pilot assignments, in fact, all assignments are based on the NEEDS of the Air Force, then generally on merit order, assuming, medically qualified, etc. There are no guarantees. If you just want to be a pilot there are many easier, guaranteed ways to make that happen.
 
Based on history, if you have a pulse, you will get a pilot spot in the academy. Kidding. Although honestly if you medically qualify which is more strict than what is needed to get into the academy, you will get a spot. Academy gets about 550 spots with a graduating class of approx 1000. There are more than enough spots between those who don't medically qualify and those who don't want to fly. Supposedly there were years when they couldn't use up all of the spots. So the joke is that the easiest way to become a pilot in the AF, is to go to the academy. Unfortunately the hardest thing is to get into the academy in the first place. So the real answer is get into the academy and do relatively well.
 
Thank you for your responses! So what I understand now is that Academy pilot selection is pretty much the same as ROTC except that you're much more likely to get a slot.
 
One specific advantage of being at USAFA is that you have more opportunities to log flight hours, and flight hours are also calculated in your PCSM score.
 
charlestonmom5 said:
One specific advantage of being at USAFA is that you have more opportunities to log flight hours, and flight hours are also calculated in your PCSM score.
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flight hours arent as important as they use to be. If you got 201 hours of flight time, it would give you a great boost to your PCSM score. Today, the most you can get is 60. Having more doesn't do anything for you. Not sure how the academy works but for Rotc, the TBAS score and the pilot score on the AFOQT test make up the majority of the PCSM score.
 
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