Need feedback on this topic:How long do you think Truck Driver Training should be??

The time I was at their school they paid for your transportation there.Don't know what its like now.This was back in 2003.You used SMX which I guess is Western now,Decker and Oberg equipment and also their trk and trl.Once you got your cdl you delivered loads with instructor and some loads were a few days out.I enjoyed it there and had an awesum class of students.

 

excellent post.You'll make a trainer proud because you're not a know it all and will listen to what your trainer is saying.

 

There are no DOT standards or requirements for the training of CDL drivers only testing. You can walk into the DMV in your hometown and pick up the study manual, study the manual, pay the fees, and take the test. You will however need a truck to do the road test in and that's it.

DOT was kicking around the idea of putting some standards and requirements when they revised the HOS and they decided against it saying that the industry was all ready demanding higher standards of drivers and it would put an unfair burden on farms obtaining a CDL.

Most companies that hire student drivers have a standard which is normally 350 hours from an accredited school. Every company is different so call around to a few companies you are interested in and see how many hours they require.

Why the short course vs. the long course:

Some students already have their class B and have been driving for sometime.
Some students are laid off or unemployed and need to receive min. required hours to find a job and return to the work force.
Some students have jobs and take the longer course to work it into their schedule
Some students want the full training and practice to have more jobs available to them and feel comfortable with the skills

Company sponsored training vs. non-company sponsored training

Their are far to many reasons to explain here why company sponsored/paid training is a very bad idea, if you really want to know there are a lot threads on this web site alone explaining the down falls and horror stories driver have been thru fulfilling those contracts.

So I will explain some of the benefits of attending a non-company sponsored schooling path.

1. Most accredited schools have FASFA and other financing options. Some state labor agencies even have free money.
2. Most schools offer lifetime job placement and normally know who is hiring locally before it is even advertised.
3. Most schools will have you pre-hired before you even finish schooling
4. If you attend a non-company sponsored training you receive all of the tax credits and deductions and NOT the company. Like tuition, books, maps, clothes, pens & pencils, notebooks, cost of a laptop/computer, cost of a printer, ink, paper, cost of the medical exam, permitting fees, meals, travel expenses, etc..
5. Normally you will start with a higher CPM rate than drivers coming out of their own school.
6. Most companies have tuition reimbursement up to $10,000 which is paid directly to you weekly or monthly with no contract.
7. You can leave the company anytime you want cause you owe them ZERO!
8. When you are in school you may find you like hauling something different than what you thought or you may receive better job offers. You are not locked into one company for the next 12-15 months so you can do whatever you want.

 

I went to a driving school while I was working full time. Took 4 months and the level of training I got from the instructors was top notch. They were really hands on and if you made a mistake you didn't get out of the seat till you got it right.as far as newbs training newbs I think it's funny that most carriers will put a guy or gal with 1 year as a trainer. Tell me has that person seen it all in that one year that can help make a situation better or worse? I saw a guy just the other day with driver mentor on the door.....I almost laughed at him on the cb but figured he didn't have it on anyway....my opinion of trainers is summed up this way. If you have more than 5 years of safe driving then you should at least think about training newbs. I was a trainer for a couple of companies I've worked for and also a driver instructor for a top driving school.

 

You have some real off the wall comments here , especially why there are no FMCSA training requirements . Here's the real reason .

http://www.ooida.com/MediaCenter/Press_Releases/pressrelease.asp?prid=21 . It certainly was not because "the industry was all ready demanding higher standards of drivers and it would put an unfair burden on farms obtaining a CDL." .
However , training requirements by FMCSA are coming . http://www.teletrac.com/fleet-management/topics/fmcsa-driver-training
Now on the benefits of private schools : Everyone knows pre-hires are meaningless . Job placement means nothing when students are placed with high turnover carriers . Ask a school for a list of students that graduated a year ago and see how many are still driving .
Low success rate doesn't reflect on the quality of the school but it does show attempting a career in trucking is a huge gamble .
" You are not locked into one company for the next 12-15 months so you can do whatever you want." Yeah , right . Try leaving a carrier in less than a year and go do whatever you want . Most likely a negative DAC will hinder you .

 

last I checked 41cpm to 46cpm is not a bottom feeder wage for a new driver....... Prime INC rejects 4 times more applicants than it accepts. Training from front to back will take you 3 months, most of it paid a minimum $600.

You have two choices:

1. Sit in a truck with 5 other students waiting on your 15 minutes to back, or turn, or do whatever they have you doing every day for a month or two.
2. Get with a program where you learn to drive while actually delivering freight and learning how to be a actual truck driver.

 

Heartland pays that in the Northeast.People think it's great pay until they realize they are only getting 1500 miles a week in the slums of the northeast...

I remember JB Hunt started this trend of .50 cents a mile...People jumped at this and in the end they were had..The guys were only getting 1500-1700 miles a week for 6 days of work..Not really worth it...

 

Prime solo drivers average 2200-2700 miles per week.

 

I see.IMO it is still not enough money for what a trucker has to go through...

.41 x 2400 = 984.00 Gross...

food = 100.00 a week...

984-100 = 884.00 - 25% taxes = 663.00

663 / 6 days = 110.00 per day....

110 / 24 hours = 4.60 an hour...

 

As long as it takes for the new driver to become competent. Durations may vary from one individual to the next, but the training should never be considered "complete" until the new driver has the skills necessary to be able to do the job safely without tearing anything up.

Of course in order to train a competent driver, you need a competent trainer. That is what is severely lacking in this industry right now. The "training" companies take a non-CDL holder, send them to a 2 or 3 week crash course in the basics...JUST enough to eek through the state exam. Then, once they have that CDL in their possession, they ride along with a "trainer" and run as a team for around 4-6 more weeks. Then, that new-hire is turned loose in his own truck. 90 days later, the company asks him if he wants to become a trainer, and offer him money (paid for all miles the truck moves). Since the new hire is only making half what he'd like to make anyway, he agrees so that he can essentially double his paid miles. Now, you've got a rookie driver in charge of training the new hire. How likely is it that the new hire will be competent after their "training" is complete?

Therein lies the rub. These mega-fleet training companies need trainers in order to support their business model, and the only way to have a sufficient supply of trainers is to allow unqualified, inexperienced people to become trainers. If trainers were required to have experience in this industry, the mega-fleets would have to pay drivers enough to entice them to stick around beyond their 1-year commitment. Of course if they paid drivers more, they wouldn't be able to cut rates the way they do in order to pick up market share...because market share means nothing when you lose money on every load. So then they'd have less freight to move because the competition would be able to haul for a comparable rate...which means less need to keep warm butts flowing through the CDL mills in order to fill seats that experienced drivers won't to haul freight so cheap nobody else would touch it.