I had a question asked a day ago regarding some of the data I have been publishing. It was, “I see some CFI certification issuance data you have put out, but I did I miss where you put something out about “how many” CFIs we are certifying?
It’s a fair question and one that I missed putting up so far this year!
So, here it is.
We are certainly increasing the numbers of CFI certificates issued in recent years, but this is something that I don’t think is a full answer to the question of our training capacity.
There are LOTS of CFIs, as of last year 125,075 in fact. But that doesn’t mean they are all engaged in training. Many of them are CFIs who have held the certificate for many years and keep it active so it doesn’t expire. That being said, we are “making” more CFIs per year in recent years.
The table to the right (and the graphic below) show that our certification issuance numbers have been increasing. This relates to the demand for pilots, and the use of the CFI job as a way to gain experience for many pilots seeking to qualify for airline (and other professional flying) jobs.
CFI turnover is typically pretty quick for many flight training providers, but the production of more CFIs helps the providers better fill the positions to provide training. It seems logical to think that newly certificated CFIs are likely to at least be using their certificate privileges for the upcoming year or so before they might transition to other jobs. More of these CFIs should be something that helps us keep meeting our demands for pilot training and our future professional pilot industry demands.
So, asked and provided, here are the data points of how many CFIs we are certificating in our system over recent years.