Starting pay

you will be out with a trainer for 5 weeks, then another for 4 weeks where you will be making 350 per week. after that you will be solo and make 28 cents per mile. at 6 mo it goes to 28 cpm, 9 mo goes to 29 cpm and at a year your at 30 cpm

 

The process goes something like this:
You will arrive in Dallas via Greyhound sometime on saturday. This trip is paid by Stevens. You will be put up in a hotel, probably the Americas Finest, with another O1 candidate as your roommate. There are no private rooms unless you pay for them.
Breakfast (consisting of stale sticky buns, cereal, juice and coffee) is provided in the time before you catch the shuttle to the yard.
Sunday morning you will be shuttled to the yard, where your orientation will begin.
There is a fair amount of waiting time sunday morning as there is usually about 4 or 5 shuttles to get everyone there. So you either wait at the lobby of the hotel, eating stale sticky buns and drinking coffee, or you wait at the steps of the outside of Stevens, wishing you had a cup of coffee.
You are told to be down stairs at the lobby to leave at 6am. People start lining up at 5am, so you seeing them out the window gets you to hurry up in case you didn't understand the process, and you arrive downstairs at 5:30am.
Doors to the training rooms open at 8am.
You have been introduced to your first lesson of OTR trucking at this point: Hurry up and Wait.
Sunday Orientation runs from 8am to 5pm with plenty of breaks along the way. Coffee is free, bathrooms are accessible and the facilities at Stevens are very good.
Lunch is provided each day of orientation.
Sunday has a lot to do with rules, safety, schedules, introductions and you will be given your drivers' manual, which you will be told...and you will likely forget..READ!
Shuttles will take you back to the hotel sunday starting at 5pm.
There are places around the hotel to get food, most people end up at the Sonics next door due to convenience and price.
Monday begins with 7am shuttles to the yard. You are much wiser now and arrive at 6:59, enjoy a repast of sticky buns and coffee while waiting your turn.
You will drink more coffee and juice than you should, and you have completely forgotten the last abdomition from the previous night: "First thing tomorrow upon arriving here will be your UA. Be prepared to pee."
You will arrive at the class, set your things down and want to head down the hall to get rid of the mornings coffee, only to be told, "Sit thee down! Do not move from these premises, lest thy be cast aside!"
Actually, you will not be allowed to leave the room until AFTER your UA.
None the less, you can join the ranks of other driver candidates doing an amusing mixture of dancing and walking while holding your legs together, cursing the last two cups of coffee.
The entire morning will be taken up with your pee test and doctor's physicals.
If you have been in the military or served on a prison chain gang, you will have fond recollection of this process.
Lunch is again provided, and aftewards there are 4 hours of orientation, great videos and tantalizing and warm hearted lectures from facinating individuals who will admonish you to remember their names and feel free to call upon them. You will however have trouble filling your brain with this trite information, since it's already overflowing with 'important stuff' earlier spoken.
Dinner at 5, a repast of indescribable feat, a true epecurians' delight.
Evening will be from 6pm to 10pm where you will be outside on the 'hill' doing skills testing. Both Monday and Tuesday nights are the same. Somewhere along the way, you will be required to do a drive test, showcasing your skills at shifting, turning, driving, and panicing with 4 other driver candidates in the back seat watching and waiting their turn at the gauntlet. The instructor/testor will have the personality of Midian James, but as long as you can hit about half your shifts, don't run any red lights, don't run over grandma on the sidewalk and only hit an occaisional curb, you will pass.
I don't want to be misleading here. The instructors/trainers are very patient, very good and don't expect you to be able to drive as well as you did for your final CDL test. This is a qualifying drive. If for some reason you don't qualify, you will be told later personally (not in front of your fellow candidates) and they will pull you aside for some additional training (no costs) until you do qualify. Usually this is done later in the week and doesn't mean more than 2-4 hours driving time.
Monday and tuesdays run from 8am to 10pm. Breakfast (!), lunch and dinner are provided.
Wednesdays are 7am to 5pm, include breakfast and lunch. This day you will fill out paperwork for HR, meet the Compliance Department head (Donna), be entertained by Bill's Safety Department Lecture (actually, his is very entertaining, but very enlightening. He does a very good job), and all those accepted into O1 training will be assigned to a trainer. Some will be held aside. This may be for medical reasons, lack of paperwork still needed (did you bring your birth cert, ss card, etc?), it could be for additional training needed...about one third will be washed out already for various reasons, the most common being failed UA tests or having lied on their applications about something.
Let me make one SERIOUS advisement here: Don't lie! Never! Many small things that can be taken care of easily at Stevens are the issues of washout because the candidate lied on the application.
If you had a speeding ticket four years ago and think it's gone...still put it down! If that's all the problem on your DMV report, it is forgiven. But if you lie and it's discovered (and they WILL discover it), you will be sent packing.
There will be abou a dozen of the condidates that are put on med hold. This usually is due to needing some paperwork.
If you are not going to be accepted, they will pull you aside personally and privately and tell you why. You won't be left hanging and wondering.
So last thing wednesday is you will be instructed that if accepted (and you know you're accepted because they have issued you your employee ID badge), bring all your 'stuff' to class the next morning and be prepared to be dispatched with a trainer.
Keep this admonishment in mind if you come to Stevens: Thursday morning you will be complacent with the shuttle schedule. You will figure you have it all down.
Thursday morning, it all changes. Everyone has their gear. It will take twice as many trips to get to the yard and Randall's speach "you don't pee without Randall's permisson, you don't move without Randall's permission and you WILL NOT BE LATE!" will still be echoing thru your mind from the previous night. So be down there early.
Thursday they will start dispatching you. You will spend much of the time sitting around twirling your pencil on the desktop and waiting.
(remember that first lesson on sunday morning?)
If you are not sent out with a trainer on Thursday, you will be given a hotel pass, sent back to America's Finest with a new roomie, then do the process all over again friday. Most candidates are gone by friday afternoon.
When you actually go out depends on a trainer fitting your profile being available. Do you smoke? Will you train with someone that does smoke, if you don't? Will you drive with a Presbyterian? (just kidding) These are the two most qualifying questions. Stevens will do their best to match you up with a like trainer.
When you step onto your trainer's truck, you will stow your gear, shake hands THEN LOG ONTO THE QUALCOM. This is when you will start your training pay.
Unless things have changed lately, training pay will be $350 per week while on the truck. If you get off your trainers truck by your choice (I mean permanently, not to go to the bathroom), the clock stops again until you get on another trainers truck.
Reasons to get off the truck that are your choice (I don't like this guy) will pause training pay until you're on another truck. If you get off due to company reasons, (changing trucks, equipment breakdown, assignment to O2, etc) your pay continues.
O1 includes 35 days on the truck, 8,000 miles driving, three mountain passes, driving in all five regions of the country and bumping a dock in the NE. If it takes more than 35 days to complete this, you will still be paid. The company does all they can to get you thru O1 in 35 days, but it may take 37, 40 or even 45 in some rare cases.
O2 is three days back in the Dallas classroom, during which your training pay continues, then you are assigned to a finish traner for three weeks.
You are then returned to Dallas for Grad Fleet training, assignment to your truck and dispatch to the world as a solo driver.
When you are assigned your truck, your training pay ceases and you will now be paid on a mileage baises. Starting pay for Grad fleet drivers is currently 0.26 per mile.
Now I know I've been a bit wordy here and answered a bunch of questions you haven't asked, however I've noticed others will post your question, then the answer brings up a whole host of questions I've answered above.
If you choose to come to Stevens, I can tell you the training is the best in the industry. People there will work very hard to help you become successful. It won't be without lumps and bumps. This is the trucking industry and if anyone tells you their company is a breeze or has 'all their act together', run as fast as you can... the other way!
This is a brutal business and there are many carcasses lying along the roadway to becomming a driver. Most are due to poor training, over anticipated expectations and an unwillingness to apply oneself to the task at hand.
The first six months of becomming a driver is not unlike boot camp.
You will hate it and love it at the same time. But I can guarantee you will be glad you did it when you are finished. (you also won't want to EVER do it again!)
Feel free to post any specific questions on this board. Others will chime in with their opinions and help. Most of us are Stevens drivers still.
Good luck with your choice.

 

He nailed it.

Nailed it again.

 

How does this change if you go to the CDL school??? and I don't mind wordy!!!

 

CDL school does not really have any bearing on training time. In my experience the only time that the training program has been altered (ie shorten or changed) has been when a driver comes to Stevens with recent/past driving experience (as in just left another company etc). There was a husband and wife team in my first training class and another person with recent experience. In these cases Stevens sat down with them and customized their training requirements. Basically they went out with a trainer for an abbreviated period of time to verify they had their act together etc. I don't know how much the training time was shortened, but I do know the requirements were modified.

I like the metaphor someone used here: its like boot camp. Trust the process, learn/ask all you can of the trainers, read your driver manual (lots of info in there) and enjoy your time on the road. I just focused on the task at hand: getting the max amount of information out of my trainer and quality seat time and before I knew it, I was headed back to the yard. It does pass quickly.

 

I think this guys name says it all lol

Yes, they pay 26 cpm your first 6 months, then you get a raise, and another raise in 3 more months, and another raise in 3 more months.

 

From the wanna be still slinging burgers....

 

Buddy of mine said the trucks will only run 62mph.....?????