Hey guys, I need some help here and figured you all would be the people to ask. Im currently 16 and working on my private pilots liscense, I love to fly, I mean a friggin love it as most or all of you probably do. I was wondering about a careet in aviation, wether it be the air force or an airline. I maintain about a 3.6 in school and have a crap load of extra curriculars, I was just wondering how hard is it to get into the airforce academy, how good is the competion. I went onto the airforce site and read their coloum in fighter pilots, cargo pilots etc...it looked like it was written for a partially retarted monkey, they all pretty much said "you get to fly, AND WE PAY FOR YOUR COLLEGE" I need much more info than that if I want to look at this as a serious career path. If thats the only info I have on getting into the airforce then im questioning wasting time in highschool following this path only to be crushed when I hand in my application. If any of you guys, or gals have an expiernce or info I would greatly apperciate it if you could share it here, as im sure a lot of you have the same questions.

I talked to a lot of recruiters and then air force guys before I came to the conclusion that the air force way is risky business. Basically with the air force you need to be in tip top shape and a certain height to be a fighter pilot, that and you need to sign something like a 7 year contract. If you fit the criteria and are okay with that then its a good option. A major advantage of the AirForce or Navy is that if you are a pilot they will use you and you will get a lot of flight hours so when you get out if you dont go career you have a boat load of hours recorded to take to the job market. As for going civil all the way there are a number of flight schools and also a number of full and tecnical colleges that have flight programs.  And after you get trained its all about getting in there and getting more hours and meeting people.

If your 16 I assume you are still in high school, talk to your  counselor about college programs and if they are clueless see if there is a book of schools in your state that lists programs, do research and compare. Alternately if your school is big enough there shold be sevral recruiters that come to your school throughout the year, if not just look them up in the phone book, there should be an office near by.

Now as for getting your foot in the door, maybe one of the more established pilots here has a good answer for that.

Well Strahl, we have a lot in common.

I am also 16, also getting my PPL, (31.8 hours in), and I also plan on flying in the airforce.

You may already know this, but you don't have to go to the airforce academy to fly.  There's also AF ROTC in college, OCS (officer candidates school), and more.  Each year there is a limited number of pilot slots available to graduatung sudents of AF academy, AF ROTC, OCS, etc.  50% of these slots will be given to graduates of the academy, with the rest being divied up between the other graduating students.

I'm not good at sports. All the clubs at my school suck.  Hence, no extra carricular actvities at school for me (although I do have non-school related stuff).  Therefore, the academy wouldn't appear to be for me, (my father knows senators and judges on the federal appellette court, but I still don't think I could get accepted) so I instead plan to do AF ROTC in college, get straight As, and get a pilot slot.  I believe that, for me, the hardest thing will be getting into flight school-once I'm in there's no stopping me

My advice?  Keep at it, and talk to a recruiter-it'll be a big help.

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My extraciriculars were stuff like TSA: Member, Anime Club: Trouble Maker, Philosophy Club: Big Trouble Maker. The only thing going for me with the military is Eagle rank which automatically gets me like a $0.10 pay raise and I'm decent with a bolt action and a shot gun.