North Allegheny students earn flying scholarships
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While most highschoolers are practicing parallel parking and highway driving, Ethan Byrne and Curtis Rhoten, both of McCandless, can flash their private pilot’s licenses.
The two North Allegheny seniors earned scholarships to the U.S. Air Force’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Private Pilot Certification program during the summer of 2022. Scholarships are awarded to JROTC cadets in high schools across the nation. Byrne and Rhoten are cadets in North Allegheny’s Air Force JROTC.
The teens met in the NA program as freshmen and soon discovered they had similar interests. They became best friends. Rhoten credited NA’s Air Force JROTC instructors Chief Master Sgt. (ret.) Terry Speer and Lt. Col. (ret.) Don Accamando with helping the cadets earn the scholarships.
“I couldn’t get the license without the JROTC. We have a good legacy,” said Rhoten about the North Allegheny program.
Rhoten and Byrne, both 17, were stationed at different training areas.
Rhoten was lodged at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore in Princess Anne, Md., and was shuttled each morning with other cadets to a regional airport in Salisbury, Md., for flight training.
Byrne attended the flight academy at Fairmont State University in Fairmont, W.Va., and got up every day at 5:30 a.m. to drive 45 minutes to a local airport for training.
After five weeks of “very rigorous” class and flight training, the students are put through a six-hour test, including a two-hour verbal exam while piloting a plane. Rhoten said that was to make sure cadets could physically operate a plane while being mentally engaged. The instructor would ask the cadets to perform different flight maneuvers. At one point, the instructor pretended he was sick to see how Rhoten would do with a distraction.
“I’ll never forget the feeling of going for my first solo,” said Rhoten.
Byrne said he enjoyed meeting other cadets from all over the country.
“I had a lot of fun,” Byrne said.
Both programs lasted eight weeks, and the scholarship paid for all expenses, including meals and board.
Obtaining private pilot’s license can cost on average $10,000 to $20,000, according to FLYING Magazine.
In addition, three more North Allegheny cadets — Jonathan Jackson, Conor Griffin, and Jacob Collins — received news in December that they received scholarships for next summer’s program, according to Accamando.
In 2022, more than 1,300 cadets applied for one of 200 Air Force scholarships. There are almost 120,000 high school students enrolled in Air Force Junior ROTC programs at approximately 870 high schools in the U.S. and overseas.
The North Allegheny’s Air Force JROTC is a high school class, open to freshmen through seniors, said Accamando, who served 23 years in the Air Force.
“Students are immersed in a variety of leadership scenarios and are taught life and leadership and aviation lessons from retired Air Force instructors,” he said. “They learn self-discipline, responsibility, public speaking and leadership characteristics.”
It is not a recruiting program for the military, and students do not have to have prior experience to be part of it, he said.
“The mission of AF JROTC is to help develop students of character dedicated to serving their community and the nation. It is not a recruiting program. This Air Force funded (program) provides a wide variety of curriculum options, but predominantly focuses on aviation and leadership. In addition to the work done in the classroom the students are afforded an opportunity to participate in a wide range of extracurricular activities,” Accamando said.
Rhoten’s first venture last summer with his pilot’s license came at the Beaver County Airport, where planes can be rented to licensed pilots. He took his family for flight, flying over their house, the high school, and other areas of Wexford. Byrne said he likes to practice flying every month.
Rhoten created his own website encouraging other students in the Air Force JROTC to pursue the scholarships and to share his experiences.
Rhoten and Byrne each said flying is an experience like none other.
“It’s a feeling you get when you’re up there. It gives you a lot of perspective,” Rhoten said.
“It gives you a different experience of the world, looking down on it,” Byrne said.
Byrne said he plans to attend college for an aviation-related degree and then enroll in officer candidate school for the military where he hopes to fly fighter jets.
Rhoten said he’s in between applying for ROTC in college or for the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado.
Both said they want to eventually retire from the military and fly commercial jets.
“That’s the dream,” Rhoten said.