Are there standards when it comes to CDL schools?

Some or many employers cannot hire you if you go to a 10 hour CDL school. Their insurance company won't allow it.

You can pay a for-profit school which is expensive but short (3 weeks) and starts next Monday or you can get on a waiting list for an inexpensive & long CDL school (tech school or community college) and spend a lot of time before you can start working & earning. In my case it was financially better to borrow $3500, go to 3 week CDL school, and start earning than to get on a 5 month wait list for an $800 course that took 3-4 months to get a CDL. I had $300 & no place to live but had a CDL job waiting for me. Trucking is nothing like a long car trip you have taken but you don't know that so you expect to be driving a semi-truck with almost no training. You will fail like 80-90% of newbies in 6 months or less if you bring that attitude into trucking like they did. Make good decisions.

 

Schneider reimbursed my tuition. Don't know if they still do it.

 

About half of the trucking companies that hire newbies reimburse newbies (weekly or monthly) for CDL loans. ALMOST nobody gives a newbie without a school loan any money for tuition reimbursement so sometimes I pays to borrow money when you don't need to. READ THE FINE PRINT.

 

The cheapest way to get it and find a farmer to work for. You may not learn the otr parts but you won’t likely share a cab for more than a couple hours. And you may pick up some valuable ways to get yourself out of a jam on the shoulder.

 

If there are any farmers left, that is. Farmers are great, understanding, patient people and would be more than happy to show someone the ropes. The downside there is, crap, bugs and smell can't bother you, but there is no free lunch. Farms escape a lot of regs, and many are buying older road tractors to pull their tanks or hopper, and the good part there is, generally, the equipment is pretty tired and a boo-boo may not be noticed. I worked on a dairy farm that had several class 8 HD trucks. A Mack poop truck, a FL grain truck and an IH sleeper road tractor. I read, between 2017 and 2022, over 141,000 farms failed in the US. That's big.

 

I thought they passed rules CDL schools had to be 160 minimum. Even with new CDL almost nobody will hire you because they know you can’t drive in city traffic and how to make turns in city streets, How about going down a mountain without overheating your brakes.

They send new CDL out with trainers to make sure you can drive without running anything over and can backup at truck stops. Usually the insurance company for the trucking companies won’t insure a new driver that’s the problem you can be to much of a risk.

Nobody likes living and sleeping in truck two guys in that small of a space. You have to look at it all guys are the same. People don’t have to judge each other. I did not like training when I started, just seemed very awkward two guys living and sleeping in truck. Years later I did the training thing you can tell everyone new driver was uncomfortable. That’s when you notice all guys are the same.

 

Schneider will give you the shortest time out on a trainer's truck.

-- L

 

Many companies that hire for local work have HIGHER standards because more drivers want to avoid being away from home for weeks.

I personally would avoid any CDL school with less than 160 hours of training because doing so greatly reduces who you can work for as a newbie. If you have a job actually waiting on you to compete CDL school then it might be safe to use a short CDL school. I think TOO MANY newbies think a CDL school must be OK or someone would close them down. That is a foolish assumption. A CDL school does NOT have to provide useful or sufficient training to stay open. They just have to collect enough tuition to pay their bills. It's very easy to find a CDL school that will take your money but not satisfy the requirements to get a job. Trucking IS NOT like other industries. Many people with no idea what they are walking into get taken advantage of before they know they were in danger. Nobody but you is able to protect you. What does your first employer in trucking require for CDL training? If you don't know then don't decide about CDL school until you know that answer.

 

Just because SOME CDL schools are accredited doesn't mean EVERY CDL school must be accredited. There are non-accredited schools willing to take your money if you like. You will have a problem getting most CDL jobs if you use one of them or any school with less than 160 hours.

Sometimes it feels like people asking these questions hear what they want to hear regardless of what answer they receive. It's your time, money, and career. Be as careful or reckless with them as you decide. It's no problem for me, I'm retired.