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Thirteen CHOICE Aviation Students Accepted at Embry-Riddle
March 12, 2007
Kendra Price was the only female to make the trip to Embry-Riddle. She plans on studying to be a pilot there, this fall. |
The students were treated to a VIP tour of the campus. They were impressed by the friendly atmosphere and small class sizes, ranging from 25-31 students at the prestigious university. |
From left, Greg Fussell, Jason Rhodes and Hunter Douglas study a TF-34 400 Turbofan engine. |
CHOICE Aerospace Dean Leo Murphy (front left) poses with instructors Pam Becker (next to Murphy), Tim Hester (far right) and the seniors in front of an Embry-Riddle aircraft. |
The internationally-acclaimed Embry- Riddle Aeronautical University has accepted thirteen seniors from Okaloosa's CHOICE program for admission next year. Eleven of the seniors were treated to an all-expenses paid campus visit to the Daytona campus, where they were given a two-day tour and had the opportunity to fly with a student pilot and instructor.
Choctawhatchee senior Chris Hector thoroughly enjoyed the trip and was pleasantly surprised by the friendly atmosphere of the school. "It seemed easy to make the transition," he said.
He was particularly pleased when he flipped through their course guide and saw that the course numbers for classes he took at Choctaw matched perfectly with those at the university. "I was so happy - I couldn't believe it. I was saying, 'I don't have to take that class or that class.' I was pretty much overjoyed," he stated.
'I wanted 100% of our students to complete the college application process.'
The idea for the campus trip came about last year. "I attended a briefing where they said that only half of graduating seniors ever apply to college and that Okaloosa County mirrored that statistic," explained CHOICE Aerospace Dean Leo Murphy. "I was determined to change that for our aviation seniors. I wanted 100% of our students to complete the college application process."
When he mentioned his initiative to the Embry-Riddle president last summer, Dr. John P. Johnson offered the VIP campus visit as an extra incentive to the students. The university paid for the students' travel, food and a wonderful hotel. "My order was 'first class,' and everything we did was first class," said Murphy.
The students were treated to a barbecue dinner at a faculty member's home and enjoyed visiting the classrooms and facilities on campus, including a control tower simulator with a 360 degree view shown on projector screens. The highlight of the trip, according to the students, was that each of them flew with a university student and instructor, observing up close what it's like to learn to fly at the renowned instititution.
Choctaw's Chris Griffith flew all around the Daytona area and got to take a good look at the race track in a Cessna 172. "They practiced take-offs, landings and stalls, where you have to dive to get out of it. You could feel it go through your body!" he recounted.
"I felt like I knew what they were talking about," said Austin Myers, a senior at Crestview. "They were doing things we've learned about - reading the CTAS [air traffic control report] and the weather report. It seemed pretty easy. It didn't seem as hard as in class, and it reinforced my choice to go there."
Kendra Price of Choctaw agreed and is looking forward to attending Embry-Riddle in the fall. She fell in love with flying after participating in her first CHOICE "fly-in" a few years ago. Up until that flight - her first in a small aircraft - she wasn't sure about what she wanted to do after high school. "It changed my mind," she said.
The "fly-in" tipped Hector's decision as well. He had been interested in aviation ever since he was young, building airplane models with his dad, but he also loved computers. "After flying in the Cessna, I was hooked," he said. What he likes best about the CHOICE program is earning high school and college credit at the same time: "We're learning the same things as college people, only we get more instructor time."
Okaloosa Schools were the first to offer aviation courses, in partnership with Embry-Riddle. Now in its third year, the CHOICE aviation program on the Choctaw and Crestview campuses has grown from 98 participants to 325. Courses offered include Meteorology, Flight Physiology, Aerodynamics, Air Traffic Control, Aviation Maintenance, Aircraft Accident Investigation, Introduction to Uninhabited Aerial Vehicles, Introduction to Space Flight and Basic Aeronautics I and II ( FAA-approved Private Pilot Ground School .)
"We haven't turned a student down yet," said Murphy. "We've had students with low high school GPA's earn A's and B's in some college classes, because they realize they want a career in aviation."
The program has been so successful that Embry-Riddle has begun offering similar programs to high schools around the country. A steady stream of visitors comes to the CHOICE classrooms to take a look at what's happening there and learn how to make the "magic" happen in their own school districts.
"We've had people from the Georgia DOE, the Ohio DOE and over a dozen Florida school districts come to see us. The FAA has told Embry-Riddle they'd like to create eight programs like ours around the Washington , DC area," said Murphy. "This has really fulfilled [Principal] Cindy Massarelli's vision of providing top-level career education in aviation."
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