FAA Moves Ahead With Airman Certification Standards for CFIs

Meg Godlewski

Wednesday, November 03, 2021 at 09:14 PM ET

Verified

The new airman certification standards for flight instructors do not yet have a release date. Adobe Stock

Key Takeaways:

Current flight instructor (CFI) test standards (PTS) lack a mechanism to evaluate an applicant's judgment regarding risk management.
The upcoming Airman Certification Standards (ACS) for CFIs, currently in development, will introduce tools and scenario-based evaluations to assess an instructor's judgment and risk management.
The ACS aims to enhance aviation safety by translating abstract concepts like "aeronautical decision-making" into specific, measurable behaviors relevant to each task.
This change addresses a "serious disconnect" by requiring CFIs to be evaluated on the judgment they are expected to teach their students.

See a mistake? Contact us.

Teaching people to fly should incorporate risk management, yet currently the test standards for CFIs do not contain a mechanism for evaluating the applicant’s judgement toward risk.

This will change with the release of the airman certification standards for CFIs, a document currently in development. The date for the release has not been set; however, last month the FAA held a meeting with the ACS working group made up of stakeholders in the aviation training industry.