Dan and I both graduated from CFCC's commercial truck driving school today and got our class A CDLs. It's great to have that behind us.

The guy in charge of the school has only been there since last October, and it looks like he inherited a mess from his predecessor which he's trying to clean up. He seems to know how to get things done, so I suspect CFCC's program will get better and better, but it looks like it will take some time. Two things during our five week course which were especially frustrating:

1.)- Visiting bureaucrats from the State and college made frequent impromptu appearances, often without prior notice apparently, which took our instructor out of the classroom to deal with their business. The instructor needs an administrative assistant or somebody to handle that bureaucratic stuff so he can do his job. There were several days when students sat idle in the classroom because the instructor was busy with these inconsiderate jerks. I wanted to walk into the office and ask these visitors, "Hey, did you pay $3,000 for this man's time? We did! Get outta here and let the man teach his class!"

2.) - Patently unsafe equipment poses an unreasonable liability for the school and risk to the students. Bald tires (some with belts showing through), bad brakes, leaking fluids plague both of the functioning "pad driving" trucks and trailers. The "road truck" has gagues that don't function, bad tires, shimmies like crazy at around 40-45 MPH, and has a cracked windshield among other problems. None of the vehicles would pass a legitimate pre-trip inspection, let alone a DOT inspection.

It's a state-run school, so there's absolutely no excuse for the safety problems there to have persisted for as long as they have. Hopefully all those visits from all those officials were aimed at correcting these problems. But if it takes constant interruptions and intrusions into students' time to accomplish that, maybe they should stop enrolling new students until they can provide for their safe and complete education.

If y'all know of any companies that make donations of serviceable tractors and trailers in good condition, point them to Central Florida Community College's commercial truck driving school!

Thanks,
Robin