47 year old unemployed ex-professor

An ARMY of one
Be all you can be
Its not a job, its an adventure !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Stay away from community college programs. They're usually a two or three week teach you how to pass the road test program. Bottom of the barrel as far as CDL training is concerned. Look for a PTDIA and ACCSCT accredited program. If you can't afford to pay for school yourself or borrow the money to do it then you'll have to bite the bullet and go with a company sponsored program and stick it out no matter what for a year or so to avoid getting charged for it later. But I would strongly suggest paying your own way or borrowing the money. When I went through school in 95-96 it cost me about $7000 for a ten week program. Expensive, but well worth it. These days you would be hard pressed to make much more than $30k a year starting out, but the money's there with potential to make more if you're willing to work and stick with it.

 

$7,000 to learn to drive a truck in 1995? holy poop on a stick!!!! did they buy you dinner first? doesn't really matter where you got to school (community college or whatever) as long as the company your applying to accepts that school's diploma. the REAL schooling takes place during the 6 weeks of training at the company. the "real" trucking school I went to took several weeks of classroom to pass the permit test as well. there was a decent amount of backing practice and almost no road time. save your money, folks. $7,000???? seriously?? I'm going to look into starting a "truck driving school."

 

Anyone with the foresight to have started a truck driving school back in 2007 or 2008 would certainly see the million dollar mark by the end of this year, raw profit. I don't think anyone is getting less than $3500 for a driving school now, even the 3 week ones are turning that per person. All it seems that you need to start one (in this area anyway) is four or five crummy trucks, some toothless wonders to act as "instructors" and a fancy sign out front. Look out Don Trump, it's Joe Blogs Truck Training going for the Fore-chune Fivehundred!

It's the only business I know of that 75% of your clients can fail in the industry they come to you with help for, and your business can still boom right along with the desperate masses that keep stacking up in front of your door. There ought to be laws...alas there is not.

I think if I had a "rewind" button, I'd take the 6K to 7K, invest in some bonds or stocks, or maybe trade for a nice car back when they had the "clunker" deals going.

Things being as they are (the real world, with no rewind button) just keep rubbing the preperation H where it hurts, smiling and nodding when the company asks you questions, and praying to sweet baby Jesus that it dosn't go on forever.

Stay safe, and good luck.

-MB

 

I paid 3,000 for driving school in 1991.
School was fully accredited and you could get government student loans and grants for it. That is one huge differance with the accredited programs. Guarenteed student loans, pell grants ect. are all there.
These are not possible at company schools or non-accredited programs. So you may pay more on the paperwork for the non-accredited schools, but you will learn allot more and be able to get grants and low interest student loans at the real schools.
I went to DDIA in Baton Rouge LA. Not sure if they are still in that location or not, but they are still active in several other locations.

 

Regardless of how much it cost it was a very good program and I had all the loans paid off within two years. I think you'll find that tuition can vary widely from program to program. A good part of the expense was room and board, and requirment of ten weeks minimum schooling to qualify for a Stafford loan only adds to that. Without the board the tuition would have been about half what it was. It was National Tractor Trailer School in Liverpool, NY. And if you go through a company sponsored program and you duck out before your minimum time that's about what they whack you for it anyway. And by the way, the starting rate at most companies for a driver right out of school was between 20 and 25 cents a mile.

 

I have to go back and look at old records to see how much it cost. For some reason 7 grand comes to mind but I also seem to recall taking out two loans for $2500. Either way it isn't cheap but if i had to go back I wouldnt do it any different.

Look at how much it costs to go to college. Lofty platitudes like "if you think education is expensive try ignorance" dont pay the tuition. Even if it was $7000 where else can a guy with no education invest that little bit and make $40 to $50 thousand a year? You won't make that much starting out (esp in this economy) but with a couple years experience and a clean record that much and more is possible.

 

I could work at wal mart, mcdonalds, or a gas station (or a combination of those)100+ hours a week and make $40-50K a year, and it wouldn't cost $7,000 to get a job there. and that's about how many hours a week you're going to put into driving a truck. I went to college for 3 years to obtain my degree, and didn't spend any where near what I spent on truck driving school ($3,000.)