While I may run the risk of beating this to death, I too feel that I must respond to the comments of tarheel87 . I am so confused as to why he would think that he is not to blame for his washing out of PSA training.
I experienced his attitude while in training. I listened to his frequent inappropriate and gender-biased comments. While meant to be funny, all they really did was reveal his true feelings toward women as professionals. Comments like those clearly showed his inability to be effective as a team player and a crew member.
PSA's training, as already stated, is rigrous. Excessively so. But that is the way the game is played. Hundreds upon hundreds of professional aviators have played the PSA game and played it with great success. But it is so much more than "Cooperate - Graduate." The vast majority of what we are required to learn is, yes, applicable. And things (training) that cost the company money are usually done for a reason (safety, efficiency, working knowledge, and regulation to name a few). Yeah, there is some ridiculous, useless information that we have to know. But put most of the blame on the FAA for that, suck it up, and learn it.
Perhaps if tarheel had spent less time on his computer or playing video games in ground school, his knowledge would have been the foundation upon which to build the rest of his hands-on training, rather than something that was crammed for the sake of the oral & written exams and then quickly forgotten.
Was the family vacation in the middle of his first airline training really that worth it? Isn't initial 121 school worthy of more than a mere 8 hours a day of "classroom work?"
To those of you who are disappointed that we would so quickly turn on one of our own, perhaps these facts will show that tarheel never quite became "one of our own." PSA cannot be blamed for his shortcomings and lack of discipline. We have some of the finest full-time instructors of any regional carrier. Help and assistance was always available to anyone that needed it, in any phase of the training.
It is interesting to note that I haven't found anywhere a post from tarheel's training partner, bemoaning her misfortune at washing out.