Juniorsmatter

Why is US Junior Soaring important?

It’s hard to find a soaring pilot in the US that doesn’t support junior soaring, but objectively why should they? What makes young pilots worth spending time and money on? In fact, seeing that most of the pilots that have disposable time and income (which make it easier to become involved) are middle-aged and older why aren’t we putting  our best recruitment efforts into this older group?

Historically you’ll find that the most active middle-aged soaring pilots did not jump into aviation cold. Many of them had serious involvement with soaring or power flying when they were younger. It is this critical exposure that plants the seed for a group of pilots to re-join the ranks of soaring. If we don’t have a constant stream of young pilots progressing, we will have to find ways to recruit even more ab-initio pilots when they are older. This would put an extreme burden on the soaring community and disrupt many US clubs.

Instead, what if we could take many young juniors and avoid loosing them from soaring in college, first jobs, and family planning years. Instead, by building a sense of community during their adolescent development, US soaring will have a strong energetic group to carry the organization on. This is accomplished by investing small amounts and removing barriers that prevent high-level flying and quick progression. This group is dedicated to doing just that; all while building the momentum of US Junior Soaring.