Comments on: Diversity in the Skies: FAA’s Controversial Shift in Air Traffic Controller Hiring

By: Let's see the data

Let's see the data — Wed, 31 Jan 2024 00:02:47 +0000

I don’t think anyone really wants to get to the hard data in these situations. If we’re so intent on identifying minorities for the input, i.e. hiring side (which I’m not saying is necessarily bad) why are we not identifying the race/ethnicity of the person causing each incident/accident. We could either put under-qualification concerns to rest, or realize dei (as it’s been conducted in several instances) may be reducing safety.
This shouldn’t be that hard to figure out.

By: Andys

Andys — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 23:48:25 +0000

@Christopher Raehl

You just proved it’s a racist policy.

I’m so happy woke, dei and esg is being rejected by society and the legal system. It’s the only real “systemic racism” that actually still exists.

It’s over.

By: Andys

Andys — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 22:59:25 +0000

@LadyOlives

Librards projecting again.
The dei issue shows that the right is about the truth.

By: Christopher Raehl

Christopher Raehl — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 22:50:44 +0000

It is, for example, entirely possible that a person with good spatial awareness who you hire off the street will make a better ATC than someone whose parents could afford to send them to ATC school.

By: Christopher Raehl

Christopher Raehl — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 22:49:18 +0000

DEI/Affirmative action doesn’t (have) to mean promoting less-qualified people based on their race/gender/etc. It just means not assuming that the white male is more qualified, and making a conscious effort to find better-qualified candidates who don’t happen to look like the workforce you currently have.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 18:32:52 +0000

When PATCO went on strike and Reagan fired the majority of controllers, who do you think filled those jobs? People walked up to air traffic facilities that wanted a job and they were literally hired on the spot. Those hires have all since retired and the FAA knew there would be a shortage but they stuck to their old practices and made people retire at age 56. Sure, there are those that want to retire asap but there are also many, like myself that wanted to keep working. I put in for a waiver, which was denied because the FAA said my facility was overstaffed even though for the previous 4 years we were all working 6 day work weeks. I am now an enroute instructor at the FAA Academy in OKC. The problem we have is there are not enough instructors to fully staff and maximize classes. This is due to the FAA not wanting to pay enough for retired controllers to want to teach. Last year they increased our pay slightly and we have since hired more but we are still below the amount needed. That is one problem. I could not agree less that separating off the street hires from those that attend college courses and allowing them to be hired directly. Why? In a normal class of 18 students, only about 40 to 60 percent pass. Some of the failures are also those that went to ATC related college courses. You either got it or you don’t when it comes to being a controller. I can understand the FAA’s position, just hire these graduates and train them on site but I guarantee that you will still get the 40 to 60 pass rate. That will end up costing much more money because these hires will be getting a salary to fail. A quick fix is to allow controllers to work until 62. If they want to retire when eligible, they will but many like myself would have not. Once again, we are doing our best to teach these new trainees how to do the job. Many are the new breed of young people that don’t want to work for it. They fail.

By: LadyOlives

LadyOlives — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 17:47:23 +0000

The right wing nutbags are always afraid of the truth and run from it. The last time the far-right was in charge, it didn’t end well for their leaders.

By: Tony

Tony — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 14:19:10 +0000

@Andrew M
By the way, US, or UK, clearly doesn’t have the most competent person(s) running their respective countries for a while now.

By: Tony

Tony — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 14:15:22 +0000

@Andrew M
You’re correct that no one would ever know whether the person who is running the country is the most competent person in that country to run that country. However, the younger Lee has the track record for the last 20 years that compares very favorably to any other leader in any other country. Singapore has managed to avoid, or dealt with more successfully, crises that all countries encountered during those two decades. Contrast that performance with what America has experienced during that same period, and continue to experience. No wonder some Americans are a little envious…

By: JRMW

JRMW — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 13:47:42 +0000

Sadly, there is inherent racism in today’s conversation. DEI is the new dog whistle, replacing the “Welfare Queen” of decades past. In this view: any person of color hired in any company that has a DEI program is inherently inferior.

Interestingly, whenever anything bad happens it must be the fault of DEI. Even though the vast majority of employees and almost every single leader is a white man.

White men at Boeing made decisions that gutted the company, ruined quality control, which lead to 2 planes crashing and a plug blowing out of their plane? Must be a DEI issue.

White men at Southwest made decisions that lead to completely inferior scheduling systems which lead to last year’s major disruption in flights. Must be DEI

The ATC is a mess. Almost everyone is white. Yep… DEI.

I am an alum of some of the best academic institutions on Earth. I saw first hand who didn’t belong. It wasn’t the almost non-existent DEI admissions. It was the Legacy admissions.

You want to fix America: End Legacy admissions for everyone at colleges.

We live in a fake meritocracy where nepotism rules the land. Let’s end nepotism. (examples from Right and Left: Donald Trump. Chelsea Clinton. George Bush II)

We should not hire substandard people under any program. However, we should give people a fair shot to apply and be seen in the application process. DEI programs that do this *correctly* can do this. DEI programs that do this *incorrectly* lead to reverse racism/sexism

Most DEI programs do this correctly