Dan Neal: Aviation professor

 

Aviation Professor at San Jose State University

Qualifications: At least a master’s degree

Work/Life balance: “We get summers off and five weeks off over the holidays. It’s a really great and rewarding job, but you’re doing a full year’s worth of work in nine months.”

Favorite part of the job: “I love seeing the growth in our students. Seeing these graduates go off and start their careers in aviation, and we see it year over year….It’s really hard to go out in this industry and not run into somebody that is a graduate from the program.”

Least favorite part of the job: “I think it’s a fallout of the COVID years. [Students] want more help than they ever needed before, but we see them unwilling in the classroom to stand up and answer a question out loud because they lost their anonymity of being at a Zoom session.”

PAY: “It ranges from about $85,000 for the lower end up to nearly $200,000 at the top end.”

At that time, SJSU was also offering an in-house A&P program that Neal completed along with his aviation degree. A few years later he sat on a job board panel review for current SJSU students and was approached to teach by the department chair.

“The chair said, ‘hey, you want to teach a class?’ So I did. And the next semester, he came back and said, ‘Do you want a full-time position?’ Which was really appealing. So, I did it,” Neal said. After five years of teaching, he left to work in various aviation, defense, and engineering jobs; most of which allowed him to continue to teach part-time.

Now, Neal is back to teaching full-time and owns and operates San Martin Aviation, a maintenance shop at the San Martin Airport and teaches courses in propulsion and aircraft systems, and avionics.

“What’s unique about those classes is they’re all lecture and lab combinations where we do hands-on things,” Neal said. “In the power plant lab, the students tear down an engine and reassemble it and it has to run at the end of the semester. In the systems class, they work on real airplanes. Most of our students are pilot-oriented, but I think it’s important they have a firm understanding of the systems that they’re operating when they do fly.”

Neal also coaches the school’s Precision Flight Team. San Jose State competes in National Intercollegiate Flying Association competitions, and for the last several years, they have performed well enough to compete in the national competition.

“I’m just really a firm believer that hands-on programs are important, especially in aviation fields, Neal said. “I think there’s a lot of teaching experience that goes along with it, but if we just present stuff to students, their retention is really weak, maybe 10 percent...but if we show them something, then show them what we want, and then make them go out and do it, I think the retention goes up immensely.” 

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