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FITS - Federal Aviation Administration Industry Training Standards

The FAA/Industry Training Standards (FITS) program is a partnership between FAA, Industry, and Academia designed to enhance general aviation safety. This is accomplished by developing flight training programs that are more convenient, more accessible, less expensive, and more relevant to today’s users of the National Airspace System. All FITS products are non-regulatory and incentive driven. FITS is focused on the redesign of general aviation training. Instead of training pilots to pass practical test, FITS focuses on expertly manage real-world challenges. Scenario based training is used to enhance the GA pilots’ aeronautical decision making, risk management, and single pilot resource management skills. We do this without compromising basic stick and rudder skills.

PURPOSE

Very simply, the purpose of this program is to ensure that general aviation pilots have access to up-to-date and pertinent information and training programs for their situation. New developments continue to take place that will have a pronounced effect on general aviation flight operations and, consequently, general aviation training. Among them are:

•	The complexity of the airspace will increase as the NAS is modernized and the FAA’s Operational Evolution Plan (OEP) takes effect. These changes will be magnified as new cockpit and other flight technologies are introduced and advanced airspace concepts such as Free Flight emerge.

•	New airspace and other operational changes will also be inevitable to accommodate aviation security concerns following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

•	New small general aviation aircraft, systems and technologies that do not fit neatly into the currently approved training programs are being produced faster than the FAA’s resources can react to them.

•	New technology systems that perform similar functions may not look alike and pilot interaction with these systems may be completely different. With older technology systems, it did not matter who built the system, they all functioned and looked similarly. The current training approach may not be adequate for these new flight and operational systems.

Finally, the FITS program will work with general aviation industry leaders to produce training standards that account for the current and future NAS and aviation technologies. These standards will be made available to the public on the FAA web site.

This program has many expectations. Among them are:

•	Maintain at least an equivalent level of safety

•	Train single pilot operations in turbine powered aircraft to operate at the same level of safety as a two pilot crew in air transportation

•	Develop and prove a training program that is innovative and more effective and goes beyond the current training programs available.

•	Set a new standard for the insurance industry

•	Training should be real-world scenario based, problem solving and case study training with definable metrics for     evaluation on aeronautical decision making, information management and risk management.

•	Write new terminology, tasks, standards and curriculum

•	A new standard for single pilot, transportation operation (piston & jet)

•	A single standard for operations in RNP airspace operating to new destinations

•	A way to collect and share best practices for all users