A Story About Second Chances and 90% Success Rates
Here’s a stat that’ll blow your mind: at most flight schools, only about 2-3% of students who start training actually finish. Yeah, you read that right. Out of 130 students who walk through the door full of dreams, maybe three will earn their wings.
Now flip that script completely upside down. At Riverside Flight Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, 90% of students finish what they start.
Let that sink in for a second.
The Wall of Dreams
Walk into Riverside’s administration building and you’ll see it immediately—a massive wall covered floor-to-ceiling with photographs. Hundreds of them. Pilots in crisp airline uniforms standing in front of 737s, A320s, even international carriers. Emirates. Delta. American. Southwest. Every major airline you can think of.
But here’s the thing: every single person on that wall started exactly where you are right now. Nervous. Maybe broke. Definitely wondering if they could actually pull this off.
“We kind of run out of wall space at this point,” jokes Chief Flight Instructor Robbie Sturdivant. But that “problem” tells you everything you need to know about what’s happening in Oklahoma.
Built on Experience (and Mistakes)
So what makes Riverside different? The answer starts 25 years ago with founder Yuri Milner, who had worked at five or six different flight schools before opening his own. Instead of just copying what everyone else was doing, Yuri did something clever: he took notes on what worked brilliantly and what absolutely sucked.
“I took all the parts I saw from other schools that they did really well and I looked at all the parts that I didn’t like,” Yuri explains. Then he built something better.
The result? A school that trains students at Oklahoma’s busiest airport (talk about learning to swim in the deep end), costs about a third of what you’d pay at a university aviation program, and gets you from zero experience to flight instructor in less than a year. Some highly motivated students are sitting in airline cockpits within two years of starting training.
Compare that to the typical four-to-six-year college aviation track that’ll cost you $150,000-$200,000 and leave you drowning in debt.
The $25 Game-Changer
Want to know if flying is for you? Most schools charge $100-$200 for a discovery flight where the instructor does everything while you’re basically a passenger with a view.
Riverside’s 25th-anniversary promotion? Twenty-five bucks. And you actually get to fly the plane—takeoff, landing, talking on the radio, the whole deal.
“If it gets 10 people actively involved and doing it, then it gives a little bit back,” Yuri says. “You have to give a lot back to the industry that’s given you so much.”
Yeah, they lose money on every discovery flight. But that’s not the point. The point is removing barriers and getting people in the air who might otherwise never take that first step.
The Secret Sauce: Positivity + Standards
Here’s what really sets Riverside apart: they’ve figured out that high standards and genuine support aren’t opposites—they’re teammates.
They train at a busy Class Delta airport because “if you can fly at Riverside Airport, you can fly anywhere in the world.” They brought maintenance in-house to ensure safety. They earned “examining authority”—a rare FAA designation that requires maintaining a 90%+ first-time pass rate on checkrides. (Riverside consistently hits 93-95%.)
But they also understand that learning means making mistakes in a safe environment. They celebrate small wins. They use humor. They point struggling students to that wall of success stories and say, “Every one of these pilots hit a rough patch too. And look where they are now.”
Your Move
Whether you’re 16 and trying to figure out what to do with your life, or 24 and tired of your current job, here’s the truth: aviation isn’t just for rich kids with connections. It’s for anyone willing to work hard and find the right environment to learn.
Yuri’s favorite success story? When he gets photos of three pilots in one cockpit—captain, first officer, and training officer—who all trained at Riverside and randomly discovered they’re part of the same aviation family.
That could be you someday.
Want to hear the full story? Check out the complete interview on The Future in Flight Podcast: https://futureinflight.com/longform_riverside_flight_center/
Blue skies and tailwinds, Future Flyers.
