Should I have gotten my private pilot before UND?

Now that you've learned about how I ended up in North Dakota, I can share how my flight training has gone so far. One of the hardest decisions to make before attending UND is deciding when to start flight training. There are pros and cons to earning your PPL before college, but I am personally glad I did.

First, the largest problem is funding. Receiving a PPL is expensive, and I ended up spending over $10,000 on mine in the Cessna 172. I was lucky enough to receive a scholarship to cover most of this. At UND, it is less costly to receive your PPL through the 102 course, from what I've heard.

Second, the 102 course is very hard to complete in one semester. My PPL took about a year through part 61, and UND wants students to finish their PPL is one semester. This is achievable, but it is a very heavy workload and most students take two semesters to finish. Coming in with your PPL, you still have to do a flight course, but this one takes around a month. Grand Forks is a very busy airspace, and a lot of students who bring in PPLs have never flown a Piper aircraft before.

Third, it completely depends on where you live. I lived an hour away from the airport I trained at, and I sacrificed a lot of my senior year commuting and flying. For some people, they don't live close enough to an airport where this is feasible. Others may live in very busy cities where the airspace is very busy.

Overall, I am glad I received my PPL before I attended college, but it wasn't necessary. UND has the flight courses in place to turn a beginner aviator into an experienced pilot.