Update on choosing a school

So a while back I posted about wanting to go to CRST's school here in CA. Read some good and some bad responses about CRST and company training in general I recently talked to a Swift driver who gave me a recruiters card and I decided to do their application online. The recruiter (and driver) I talked to was from the refer division. Now I'm looking at them because I can pay $3,800 up front (or on the back end) and have no commitment to work for them. In the meantime I'm going to continue driving for the company in with now and switch my NVDL to CADL and apply for the class C CDL and hazmat and maybe the airbrake endorsement (I intend to get this done this month). Thing is my goal is OTR, terminal to terminal, drop and hook driving. Does anyone think Swift can (or CRST) can provide that. A plus with Swift is, I believe after 3 months I can drive solo if I want. All answers and input is welcomed.

 

Correct Class C is under 26K but a Class C CDL allows me to travel interstate where as now I'm locked in to just CA trips. We get a lot of trips to Reno. Vegas,and Phoenix that they could run with a 16' bobtail but run with larger trucks because small truck drivers don't have CDL's (they may have an airbrake endorsement, but not the CDL).Figure for the $86 investment (CDL + HazMat), I can earn more.