Trucking school lenght

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You don't know jack bud.

You just wait & see Skippy...

 

Well seriously, your name here, "I want to drive all day", will soon be, "when is this day gonna end".

Don't rush it. You are lucky as I see it to have a long time in school. Right now you think it is so easy. You ain't seen nothing yet. The school is teasing you to go past your "quit out of school so you have to pay the full amount".

Take each day, one at a time, and relax AND focus on learning how and what and why to do it.

You'll be fine, as soon as you get the ants outta yer pants.

 

So what have you taken out on the road both cab & trailers wise?
Tight city streets or wide open streets? Hi Way & back country roads?
What has the weather been like sunny & 50* out?

I was in for 22 weeks 12 were in class before we hit the field. We had sleeper & day cabs, flat bed & 48' van.
First time in the truck (sleeper/flat bed) was tight city streets to get to the Hi Way. Got off & on at every exit for breaking, down & up shifting.
Also had that same truck/trailer out in pouring rain city/hi way & back country roads. Day cabs/van was mostly city streets but did hit the hi way once.
I also did D&H/PTI/maneuvers in snow.

Don't go so fast so you can try all different types of trucks/trailers and weather before you "have to" for a pay check.
Dave ----

 

Some of these CDL factories are ridiculously short... 3 weeks?

 

And all they really do is help you pass the written and road tests, "graduate, and get that certificate" that "proves somehow" that you had training, (to me, the bare minimum to pass both), to satisfy the insurance companies. The training part? Comes when you get a job.

And for the price of__________? See Ya LAYTA!

 

No school can prepare you for 10 plus hour days driving day after day without a break. They can't teach you how to drive sick, hurt, tired, angry. Did they teach you life skills to deal with missing important family events throughout your life as a driver? Are you ready to give up your friends and social life at home? Did they spend anytime on the complex legal issues criminal and civil you may face including taxes? How about did they make you understand that for the most part you and you alone are the only one who actually cares about you. Nobody cares what happens to you out on the road. Oh sure you might meet the occasional nice helpful person. For the most part its you against the world. Forget about the all the positive things they are hyping. Trucking is in a lot of ways very nasty and cruel.There are just too many things to go on here about what you need to know and what you are not being taught. Not to put you down. Its just that you are severally undereducated about the realities coming out of any trucking training mills. Reality doesn't care about positive attitudes. Positive attitude is just smiling when your getting screwed. 11 years doing this? I've only have worked with or known a handful of so that I would call "Driver." You just might make that someday who knows. But to get there is going to cost you more than you can imagine.I'm not there myself.

 

What you say is true, and of course I agree. No school talks the negatives, as you say, they do hype the money one can earn, but NEVER the real amount of not only hours, but DAYS one has to work, which when broken down, comes to an hourly wage of (most times) under $10 per hour, not as good as some factory jobs pay! Yes,NO ONE CARES about YOU!. When you are driving on a weekend to get to an all important delivery first thing Monday morning, and you're on the highway, clogged with beach or lake or holiday traffic, NO ONE CARES that they cut you off for thier exit, or that you are missing out on YOUR weekend. Yes, NO ONE CARES about you on the road when you break down, get sick or for whatever reason, you are parked on the shoulder or in a rest area or truck stop, and you are suffering a heart attack, or got knifed by a hoodlum.

Some of what I had said above, but also, no matter what some of us say, there will always be those that will not get it through thier heads. "they like to drive", or "can drive all day", or "always wanted to drive but did something else instead", yada, yada, yada.

In the end, the statistics weed out the ones that were never meant to get into trucking. Then they have the mitigating gall to put it down, on how lousy an industry it is, how bad thier driver trainer was, how bad the company was, etc,etc.

I cannot for the sake of God, think why any company, or trainer will or would "coddle" newbies, and why should they?

I think that not so much the mistreatment they claim, but the "education" they get while on the road, TOUGHENS THEM, much like basic training will do for a new recruit.

Do we want new military recruits to be submissive and cave in and give up, or put up a good fight and DEFEND not only themselves but their country as well?

Same with trucking, by "defending" thier profession to do it properly and to SURVIVE the rigors of the road, the life, and LIFESTYLE of the job at hand.

But sadly, way too many "dream the dream" and feed off of the movies and tv shows and stories they read about and hear about, all to be severely disappointed, nothing ever prepared them for the truth.

 

Haha, I had a 24 week school and know the anticipation. Just relax and enjoy your time in school. Just like others have mentioned, you'll be out there soon enough.. Best of luck!

 

I wish it was law that every school was 18 weeks.Problem we have now is students don't receive enough schooling and training.Your time will come soon enough and once it does you'll be saying i'm sick of driving.