Flight Attendant Certification

[Light Years]

Does anyone know when the certification of flight attendants is happening, or any more details about it?

 

[700UW]

This is about CAL, but maybe it will help you:

http://www.iamdl142.org/fa/co_fa_cert_bull.htm

 

[jimntx]

What exactly is certification supposed to accomplish for the average F/A? I'm not sure. I mean the guy who ran my parking garage when I worked in PHL was a CPFM

Certified Parking Facility Manager

I wish I made that up but I didn't. If we have certifications for the guy in the Parking garage haven't we diluted the meaning of certification? Just a thought.

PB, I'm not sure how it will work out in the end, but in addition to standardizing a/c training across all airlines--i.e., a 737-trained f/a at AA would also be certified on a UA 737--certification was to include additional training in self-defense/martial arts/defense of the a/c. The cockpit may have that pistol now, but they ain't suppose to come out of the cockpit with guns ablazin. The pistol is supposed to be used only if the cockpit door is breached. That leaves the flight attendants and the passengers as the true defenders of the a/c.

Quite frankly, a lot of flight attendants are concerned that all certification will accomplish is providing the airlines with a ready-made pool of trained scabs in case of contract negotiation impasses/strikes/etc. Today, if AA were to go under, a 20 or 30 year AA flight attendant would have to go through U or UA's entire training program--say 5-6 weeks--before the FAA would approve that flight attendant working as a flight attendant at either airline. Theoretically, if there is industry certification by a/c then the only training that AA flight attendant would have to go through would be the differences in service standards and procedures. That could probably be done in a week or less.

And, I agree with you that certification is losing meaning. When I was in college, I worked as a scrub tech one summer. The scrub tech is the person who hands the instruments/etc to the surgeon during an operation. Today that job is "certified" and in a lot of hospitals it doesn't even exist--a registered nurse or licensed vocational nurse is required. Whether that is good or bad is an argument for another day. But, it sure does raise the cost of performing the operation.