High School Aviation Maintenance Programs: FAA Should Assess Expanding Access to the Mechanic Knowledge Test

Filed 1h ago · Via GAO · The Buffoon Desk

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Super Polka

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: Joe Mabel · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

A GAO report finds the FAA has failed to establish an Airman Knowledge Testing Working Group that the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024 required by May 2025, to study whether graduates of uncertified aviation maintenance high school programs should be allowed to take the mechanic's general knowledge test. FAA officials told GAO they couldn't convene the group because the Department of Transportation terminated all advisory committee members under an executive order aimed at eliminating 'unnecessary' committees. At least 43 high schools run uncertified programs whose graduates currently cannot take the test without further training elsewhere.

With the Bureau of Labor Statistics projecting about 11,300 open aircraft mechanic positions annually through 2034, GAO recommends FAA find some mechanism, advisory committee or otherwise, to assess expanding test access. DOT concurred with the recommendation, though the report doesn't say when or how that assessment will now happen.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

An executive order aimed at trimming red tape managed to delete the very committee Congress created to address a mechanic shortage, which is either an impressive coincidence or a demonstration of how blunt instruments work. DOT's polite agreement with GAO's recommendation costs nothing and commits to even less.

Source: Read the original at GAO → Scored: Super Polka · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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