Getting Started

Learning to fly is, unfortunately, expensive! But, if it’s a dream of yours, by no means let that deter you.

There are two flight training options which are most convenient for Harvard students; both flight schools are located at Hanscom Airfield in Bedford (about 10 miles west of campus. You can get there by taking the red line T to Alewife, and then taking bus # 76 to the "Civil Air Terminal." More information can be found at: http://www.mbta.com/)

The two flight schools are:

1. East Coast Aero Club

2. Executive Flyers' Aviation

We recommend you visit their websites, since they have some great information on learning how to fly and will most likely answer the majority of the questions you may have.

Discovery Flights - Many flight schools have "discovery flights" for first-time flight students which cost less than regular flights. Make sure to call and ask your prospective flight school if they offer these. If so, use these flights as an opportunity to gauge your compatibility with the flight school, and to get an initial taste of flight training in general.

Costs - There are basically two parts to getting your license - the "theory" and the "practice." The practice is expensive - it costs around $100 per hour (or more, depending on what plane you fly in) to rent a plane, in addition to about $50 per hour for the instructor. You need a minimum of 40 hours of flight time in order to get your license. This technically comes out to "$6000," but, in reality, it usually takes student pilots more than the minimum 40 hours to get their license, and the cost would be more around $7000 - $8000. However, the "theory" part of getting your license is easier to complete, and you may want to get that out of the way while you’re in college. This consists of an FAA Written Exam that you need to take and pass, with a 70% or higher; we have all of the pertinent study guides in the basement of Cabot Library (in the Science Center), next to the elevator (on the back shelf). Your private pilot FAA written exam will be randomly generated by selecting 60 questions from a pool of approximately 700 possible questions. The study guides for this exam contain all of the possible 700 questions, verbatim.