Women share ‘on air’ dreams

MANILA, Philippines — Pursuing a career as a pilot is said to be only for the affluent. For parents of a would-be aviator, they have to be ready for six-digit figures worth of sending a child to school annually, multiplied by the average four years to complete the course, plus training and licensing costs to comply with stipulations.

Undeniably, this is the biggest hurdle for many pilot aspirants who end up seeing their dreams too unrealistic for their financial capacit. Enroling in a flying school is too expensive it’s actually not something an average family can afford.

Janine Alyssa Marie Bautista, who graduated as an aeronautical engineer at the Philippine State College of Aeronautics, agrees. Fortunately, she was one of only 16 to be chosen out of 12,500 aspirants who qualified for Cebu Pacific’s Cadet Pilot Program, a ‘pay now, study later’ scholarship scheme for aspiring pilots who are financially challenged.

“I belong to a middle-class family and since my father passed away last 2016, we went through financial problems. My mother is a municipal employee with a low income,” Bautista said. She actually thought becoming a pilot was impossible with her circumstances.

The 24-year-old aircraft mechanic at A-Plus Aviation, which partners with Cebu Pacific for its aircraft maintenance, still remembers how she urgently applied for Cebu Pacific’s exclusive program.

Since she was already working as a mechanic for Cebu Pacific then, a pilot asked her if she had already applied.

“Applied for what, captain?” I told him. “He told me that Cebu Pacific launched this program. The very next day, I applied,” she recalled.

Bautista is now belongs to the pioneer batch to successfully pass a series of screening and tests, as well as thorough medical and physical examinations

Martha May de Leon is the other female cadet pilot. Receiving pressures to pursue a career as a flight attendant instead because of her gender, she resolved to focus on the technical side of aircraft duties.

“I was motivated to prove that women can do it, too,” the aeronautical engineering graduate from PATTS College of Aeronautics said.

Cebu Pacific’s innovative Cadet Pilot Program is an intensive aviation program at Flight Training Adelaide in Australia where cadets will undergo a 52-week training.

After the successful training, the cadet pilots will acquire type-rating and licensing requirements to become commercial pilots. The program guarantees the cadet pilots to become first officers at CEB and will join the corps of aviators at Cebu Pacific, flying domestic and international routes.

Applicants for the second batch of CEB Cadet Pilots are currently in the screening process while applications for the third batch is set to open in May 2018.