What is a Flight Instructor Rating?
The Flight Instructor Rating qualifies a licensed pilot to teach, to deliver flight instruction to student pilots. For many new commercial pilots it serves two purposes at once: it is a professional qualification in its own right, and it is one of the recognised ways to build the flight experience needed for an airline career.
SkyTeam offers a conditional opportunity to work as an instructor after graduation for qualified students, based on performance, results, conduct and the academy's internal assessment. This is not a guaranteed job for every student.
All Programs
Explore every training path at Sky Team Aviation.
Flight Training Requirements
The practical training concentrates on instructional technique, flying and teaching the standard exercises to the required standard per the relevant civil aviation authority. In total: 20 hrs flight & simulator (15 dual + 5 sim), plus 20 hrs briefing (ground time, not counted as flight hours), and 2 theory subjects.
What this program gives you
Work at respected flight schools.
Pursue career opportunities with airlines, charter operators, and private operators.
Gain hands-on experience in training.
Examinations & Your Pilot Journey
To obtain your Instructor Rating, you must complete 2 theory subjects (written exams) and the instructor skill test. This milestone sits on a structured aviation career path.
Instructor Skill Test
A practical skill test with a designated examiner who assesses both your flying and your ability to teach flight exercises to a student.
Your Path Beyond PPL
Your progression follows a structured pathway toward becoming a professional airline pilot.
Who Can Apply
To enrol in the Instructor Rating, you must hold the following prerequisite qualifications.
Valid CPL with Instrument Rating (IR) and Multi-Engine Rating (MER).
Class 1 medical certificate
English proficiency: ICAO English language proficiency, Level 4 minimum, is required.
Training fleet: Cessna 172, Piper PA-28, Beechcraft Baron 55, Diamond DA42.
Full requirements checklist
Hold a valid Commercial Pilot License (CPL) with Instrument Rating (IR) and Multi-Engine Rating (MER).
Pass the 2 SA-CAA theory subjects (written exams).
The course must cover the theory of instruction, along with delivering briefings for ground and air exercises.
Complete at least 20 hours of patter training.
Complete a combined practical and theory test conducted by an authorised examiner appointed by the SA-CAA.
Meet the requirements? The next step is your application.
Check your eligibility and applyWhat You Can Do With an Instructor Rating
The Flight Instructor Rating authorises you to provide flight instruction and build instructional hours.
Provide flight instruction within the rating’s scope
Build instructional flight time toward higher ratings
Conditional instructor opportunity for qualified graduates
Opportunity depends on performance, results and assessment
Time to Complete
2 months
Your training timeline depends on how consistently you train and how quickly you progress.
Training frequency
Student availability
Weather conditions
Learning pace
Flight Instructor Rating Cost for Students in Egypt & the Gulf
The cost of obtaining an Instructor Rating (CFI) depends on your training pace, flight hours, and overall progression.
Your investment is tailored to your training plan.
Every student progresses differently, which means your total investment is influenced by how consistently you train and how efficiently you build your flight hours.
Get Your Personalized Cost Breakdown
Speak with our team to receive a clear, structured breakdown tailored to your training plan, no commitment required.
Request Pricing DetailsWhy Students Choose Sky Team
In this video, we explain why students choose Sky Team Aviation Academy.
Instructor Rating FAQs
Common questions about CFI training at SkyTeam Aviation.
What does the Instructor Rating allow?
Is a job with SkyTeam guaranteed?
Why do pilots become instructors?
How long does it take?
What pilots earn — and why we will not print a number here
Pay is the question everyone arrives with, and it is the one where most of what you will read online is invented. There is no single pilot salary. What a pilot is paid depends on the airline, the aircraft, the seat, the hours flown in a given month and the country the contract is written in — and most of the figures circulating online name no source at all.
So this page will not print one. What we will say is what the Instructor Rating changes about your position: it lets you teach, and be paid to do it while your own hours build, and that is what moves you along the ladder that pay follows. We have written separately about how pilot pay is actually built up — basic, housing, flight-hour allowances — and why two pilots on the same licence can be paid very differently. Read that before you judge any number you are quoted.
Where this takes you
Sky Team is an admissions and placement office: we place students with a flight academy in South Africa, and the academy delivers the training under its own civil aviation authority. What you leave with is a licence recognised on that authority's terms — not a job offer, because no training provider anywhere can offer you one.
What the Instructor Rating does is open a specific door: it lets you teach, and be paid to do it while your own hours build. We have Saudi students who have been through us and hold both the private and the commercial licence.
What comes after that is an airline's decision, not ours, and it turns on your hours, your ratings, your medical and your English. Anyone who tells you a training course comes with a seat at the end of it is selling you something we would not.
