Is a College Degree Required to Work for an Airline?
This is probably one of the most frequently asked questions that we get from people like you who want to become professional pilots, and it is a great question to ask. It is also a question that will generate a wide range of responses.
The short answer is no, a college degree is not generally required to apply for or gain employment as a professional airline pilot. With that being said, there are still many benefits to getting a degree that you should consider before making the decision to forgo a college education.
Regional & Major Airlines
Regional airlines have long since been a strong career choice for professional piots who want to move up to a major or legacy mainline airline while gaining industry operating experience that cannot be obtained anywhere else.
During normal economic circumstances, most, if not all regional airlines and many major airlines do not require First Officer applicants to possess a Bachelor's Degree to gain employment if they meet the eligibility requirements for an Unrestricted Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) Certificate or a Restricted ATP Certificate with 1,500 hours of total flight experience.
In order to be eligible for a Restricted ATP Certificate with less than 1,500 flight hours and consideration for employment, applicants are required to possess at least an Associates Degree (1,250 flight hours), and those applicants who hold a Bachelors Degree can be hired with a few as 1,000 flight hours.
As you can see, even at a regional airline, you will get hired faster with a college degree.
To quantify this, it would take a person flying 50 hours a month an additional 10 months to become eligible for an Unrestricted ATP Certificate and employment at a regional airline over someone with Bachelor's Degree and a Restricted ATP Certificate.
Also, it is important to understand that all major airlines usually will only consider applicants who possess an Unrestricted ATP Certificate, which is not tied to any college education or a degree.
Legacy Airlines
Historically, legacy mainline airlines (think of American, Delta, Southwest, and United) have always required applicants to possess a Bachelor's Degree as part of applying for and gaining employment.
Minimum vs. Preferred Qualifications
What we are seeing today though is that even many legacy airlines no longer list a college degree as a minimum qualification to submit an application. Note the key word here: "minimum".
Most, if not all legacy airlines still list a Bachelors Degree as a "Preferred" qualification for employment. Experience has shown us that applicants who meet more of the preferred qualifications are placed much higher in the candidate pool than those applicants who meet less or only the minimum qualifications and offered interviews and jobs first.
Additionally, most management positions (think a Chief Pilot or Director of Flight Operations) require applicants to have a college degree.
What does this mean to you?
Projected Hiring Needs
Legacy airlines are projecting the need to hire tens of thousands of pilots over the next decade and beyond. In fact, over the next 20 years.
Boeing predicts that the industry will need more than 600,000 pilots. This translates into hundreds of pilot a month being hired. You could be one of them!
Economic Impacts to the Airline Industry
The facts that were just presented to you are currently what the industry is experiencing. All airlines are robustly hiring and the movement is unlike anything that we have seen before. We strongly caution you to remember that today's hiring market is not guaranteed to remain this way and in fact it can change seemingly overnight. We were reminded of that painful lesson most recently in 2020.
The effects of the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out nearly all demand for air travel in the spring of 2020. This forced airlines to completely stop pilot hiring, cancel training classes, and rescind previously issued Conditional Job Offers. All airlines went from hiring as many pilots as they could to hiring no one. Many airlines turned to incentivized retirements and voluntary separations, paid or unpaid leaves of absence and even mandatory furloughs.
When hiring finally resumed in early 2021, it was only a small trickle of what it was just a year before. Demand was so weak for qualified pilots that early in the industry recovery, even regional airlines were only accepting applicants who had a college degree. Now that there is a strong demand for qualified pilots, regional airlines have once again stopped requiring a degree.
History is full of reminders that the economy is fragile, and can collapse in what seems the blink of an eye. Every 10-12 years, events have happened that have momentarily crippled the aviation industry, and have even caused entire airlines to fade into memory.
The Gulf War in 1990 caused suring oil prices that ultimately led to the collapse of Pan Am and Eastern Airlines.
The events of September 11, 2001 lead to a massive shrinkage in the aviation industry, and TWA did not surived. Many pilots at American and United lost their jobs as well. America West Airlines failed shortly after and merged with US Air.
The "Great Recession" of 2007-2009 upended the industry again, and 4 more airlines disappeared (ATA Airlines, Continental Airlines, Northwest Airlines, and US Airways)
COVID-19: Compass Airlines, Trans States Airlines, and ExpressJet all ceased operations as a direct result of the economic carnage done by COVID-19. ExpressJet did relaunch its own independent operations in 2021, but at a fraction of the size they were in 2019, but ceased operations again in the summer of 2022.
Things To Consider
We would strongly caution you not to be deceived by someone who tells you that a college degree is not worth earning or is not required any longer. This statement is simply not true. This is a highly competitive industry and you might be passed over for that dream job if you are not equally competitive in your personal and professional qualifications.
An undeniable fact is that a Bachelors Degree will make you more competitive. Experience continues to show us that applicants who are not competitive will limit their hiring potential and the airlines where they will be eligible to apply to or gain employment at.
The most common airlines that do not require any kind of degree include:
Alaska, Allegiant, Avelo, Breeze, Frontier, Hawaiian, JetBlue, Spirit, and Sun Country
All regional airlines
Before moving on, this is not to suggest that any of these airlines are not worth taking a very serious look at, because they all are. Each of these airlines has much to offer a pilot and one can make a decent living even as a Captain at most regional and low-cost airlines.
Probably the most significant thing that a prospective student who is contemplating a professional career in aviation needs to understand when making the decision to get a college degree or not is to ask themselves "which airline do I want to work for, long term?" After answering this question, go to that airline's careers page on their website and find their requirements to be eligible to apply for a First Officer position. Doing this will help you understand how you can be the most competitive applicant when you are ready to apply and interview, and increase your chances of landing that Conditional Job Offer.
Finally, having a college degree will not prevent you from feeling the effects of a negative economy. Plenty of pilots who have degrees have. been either furloughed or laid off over the years. What it does protect you from is remaining unemployed long term. Historically, 12-24 months following an event that causes an economic recession that forces airlines to slow or even stop hiring, they resume hiring again, and each time, the applicants with a college degree get hired first.
Benefits of a University Aviation Degree Program
Enrolling in a Aviation Degree program offered by an accredited college or university, you are giving your future career a starting point that is well ahead of those who choose to skip this step.
The academic course work offered by the university will contain classes that will give you knowledge and critical-thinking skills that are specifically designed to prepare you for your future professional career. You may also qualify for a Restricted ATP Certificate in as few as 1,000 hours of flight time, getting you to that first jet job faster.
Another benefit is that you will have immediate access to student financial aid to help pay for your education, including your flight training, which creates a pathway for you to complete your training significantly faster than you could otherwise without that funding.