Hiring Bid FAA-ATO-21-ALLSRCE-73599

Hey all. I'm very new to this. It's my first time trying out for this job. Have no idea what to expect.
If I happen to get picked, and it's a huge "if" because I only "qualified", what happens next? Do I get auto assigned to a state? Is there some agency on my part to choose where I go or am I gonna be shot off to Alaska with no chance otherwise? Lol
I think most of your questions can probably be answered by reading the FAQs. Also check out Reddit
 
My facility gets 2 travel days. My placement day at the academy (the day you officially choose your facility) was on a Wednesday and my 2 travel days were Thursday and Friday. As someone said you get 64 hours of change of station leave which is 8 days. So I had Saturday/ Sunday as free leave as its the weekend and then 8 work days, meaning I could have shown up between the Friday after I graduated or the Wednesday 14 days after I placed.

You call the facility when you place and you work with them when you want to show up. You can choose to use all your change of station or use some, or use none. You have 2 years from the day you graduate to use all 64 hours. You dont have to use it all as a day either. You can use it hour by hour. So lets say you use 6 change of station days you have 16 hours left. You can use 2 hours one day to maybe get your license changed or have the wifi get setup or whatever.
 
They probably felt sorry for me for trying so many times lol never give up. If you didn’t do well. See what you could improve on. Where did you struggle?
I think I struggled the most on the radar simulation, mostly because of the math portion while trying to eliminate any collisions at the same time. To be honest with you, I didn't answer all the math questions and just focused primarily on the collision parts, which by the end of it I had maybe about 5 collisions in total - not the greatest. The other struggle I had was the logical reasoning. That felt like such a riddle to me and I had to keep reading the prompt over and over which make it even harder considering that it's timed. I just guessed on the last 2 or 3 because of the time running out. This probably had a factor in it, but the personality one was so weird. I hated how they have you 3 choices per set and you had to choose 1 that is "mostly you" and 1 that is "not mostly you" (I think that's how it went) and leave the 3rd one unanswered. To me I hated that because there were sets where all 3 answers were mostly me...but I couldn't choose all 3!

TL;DR: The radar simulation I struggled on mostly because of the math problems and not answering all the math questions and the logical reasoning/riddle section.
 
Hey all. I'm very new to this. It's my first time trying out for this job. Have no idea what to expect.
If I happen to get picked, and it's a huge "if" because I only "qualified", what happens next? Do I get auto assigned to a state? Is there some agency on my part to choose where I go or am I gonna be shot off to Alaska with no chance otherwise? Lol
Hard to know for sure. FAA and government agencies are hard to predict.. but if you’d are picked, you will get a TOL, then they will probably do more on boarding exams for health and background checks..

I think I struggled the most on the radar simulation, mostly because of the math portion while trying to eliminate any collisions at the same time. To be honest with you, I didn't answer all the math questions and just focused primarily on the collision parts, which by the end of it I had maybe about 5 collisions in total - not the greatest. The other struggle I had was the logical reasoning. That felt like such a riddle to me and I had to keep reading the prompt over and over which make it even harder considering that it's timed. I just guessed on the last 2 or 3 because of the time running out. This probably had a factor in it, but the personality one was so weird. I hated how they have you 3 choices per set and you had to choose 1 that is "mostly you" and 1 that is "not mostly you" (I think that's how it went) and leave the 3rd one unanswered. To me I hated that because there were sets where all 3 answers were mostly me...but I couldn't choose all 3!

TL;DR: The radar simulation I struggled on mostly because of the math problems and not answering all the math questions and the logical reasoning/riddle section.
The radar section, focus on avoiding collisions. Just guess on the math and if you can get it right do so, but don’t pay much attention to it. I had about 8 collisions and got BQ… logical reasoning kicked my ass too. I guessed on the last 5-6 questions. Personality test is not where you answer honestly, they are not your therapist… you need to come off as an alpha male. I am one naturally so it came to me easily. That portion counts, they want an alpha that can work as a team and also as an independent minded person who is decisive. Hope that helps.
 
Hey all. I'm very new to this. It's my first time trying out for this job. Have no idea what to expect.
If I happen to get picked, and it's a huge "if" because I only "qualified", what happens next? Do I get auto assigned to a state? Is there some agency on my part to choose where I go or am I gonna be shot off to Alaska with no chance otherwise? Lol
If you get picked, you will have more hoops to jump through. Medical exam, security clearance, background, psychological test. If you pass all those you get COL and Academy dates. Once you pass academy you will then get a few choices for the state based on how you scored relatively to others in your class.
 
The radar section, focus on avoiding collisions. Just guess on the math and if you can get it right do so, but don’t pay much attention to it. I had about 8 collisions and got BQ… logical reasoning kicked my ass too. I guessed on the last 5-6 questions. Personality test is not where you answer honestly, they are not your therapist… you need to come off as an alpha male. I am one naturally so it came to me easily. That portion counts, they want an alpha that can work as a team and also as an independent minded person who is decisive. Hope that helps.
I found someone who will fail thr MMPI... LOL
 
I'm not trying to be a Debbie downer but that test prep has no correlation with how you'll do at the academy or even at the your facility. Lots of people get to the academy only to fail or they'll pass through academy and then wash out at their facility. The job isn't for everyone. These test preps didn't even exist a few years ago but there are still plenty of controllers working mandatory 6s. If it helped you then that's great. Don't expect it to work for others.
 
Personality test is not where you answer honestly, they are not your therapist… you need to come off as an alpha male. I am one naturally so it came to me easily. That portion counts, they want an alpha that can work as a team and also as an independent minded person who is decisive.
This is definitely what not to do. It's not 1965, stop acting like tough men are the only people who can do the job. It's not public knowledge exactly what the FAA looks for in their candidates, but I can tell you my facility is not full of "alpha" males.
 
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Hey all. I'm very new to this. It's my first time trying out for this job. Have no idea what to expect.
If I happen to get picked, and it's a huge "if" because I only "qualified", what happens next? Do I get auto assigned to a state? Is there some agency on my part to choose where I go or am I gonna be shot off to Alaska with no chance otherwise? Lol
If you are selected to be pushed forward, you'll be contacted to take more tests.
There's a basic health physical where they check the your vision, hearing, ecg, etc.
Drug urine test. MMPI which is like a psychological exam consisting of around 450 questions on a computer. Background check. If you pass all of these successfully, you'll be placed in a class in Oklahoma city where you'll go through a pass or fail academy based on your scores. There's no assignment to specific states. Its based on wherever they have needs for staffing. If you pass, you'll be given a list of facilities that you'll pick from based on your score rankings within the class. (If you are third in the class, you'll be the third one to pick, etc.) Your chances of going straight to Alaska is pretty thin. You might end up in the enroute track where there's Centers placed in mostly major cities or you might start in a terminal environment and start in a small airport tower in more rural places.

Some of y'all are going to learn how to be humble veeeeeery quickly if you ever make it through academy. You literally just took the atsa. All it means is you passed a basic screening test that the faa came up with not knowing if it even has any correlation with your probability of being successful in this career
 
Anyone have experience with the medical clearance process know what to expect if I haven't had a physical exam done in at least 5 years? I understand they want records but what if I don't have any?
 
Anyone have experience with the medical clearance process know what to expect if I haven't had a physical exam done in at least 5 years? I understand they want records but what if I don't have any?
Assuming you’re in good health and don’t have any medical conditions that would pose an issue, they won’t ask you for records. The physical exam will consist of an EKG, vision, and hearing test.
 
Anyone have experience with the medical clearance process know what to expect if I haven't had a physical exam done in at least 5 years? I understand they want records but what if I don't have any?
The physical exam is conducted by the Flight Surgeon.
You will be tested on your vision and hearing, color blindness, etc. You'll also do an EKC and take a urine test. The doctor will ask you a series of questions.
 
I bet there’s people that failed the ATSA that could of passed the academy. In no way is the test accurate in seeing if you have the ability to make it based on your ability to pass the test.
So how do you recommend they narrow down the 10,000+ people who apply to the 500-1,000ish who get TOLs? There's got to be a way to eliminate and rank people somewhere.
 
The ATSA test is not a accurate way to determine your ability to pass the academy. I bet there’s people that failed that could of made it through the academy.
How would you know without having successfully completed training? Based strictly on what I’ve read about academy, I don’t think what you’re saying holds water. The test is designed to apply stress to the test taker and assess how they perform under pressure. It would seem that’s a common theme between the ATSA, academy, and facility training. I am not saying it’s perfect, but I feel like it is reasonable to assume the ATSA accomplishes something in upholding the FAA’s approach to hiring suitable employees.
 
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