Aviation security training is important. Last month, we talked about who needs to take training, but there are still some questions hanging in the air. Currently, there are a number of people who forget to take training or don’t think they need to have training. This week, I’ll talk a bit more about who needs to take aviation security training.

The most commonly forgotten groups, when it comes to security training, come from some of the less-regulated places in the industry. If you are an FBO that is a gateway to DCA, odds are that you are missing someone. Some inspectors require everyone in your company to participate in general security training.  Some people think, "Well, my receptionist doesn’t deal with customers very often and doesn’t fly so she does not need additional training." Your inspector could very easily disagree with you and could result in adverse action. Simply put, "everyone" means everyone; receptionists, office assistants, ramp personnel, marketing personnel… the whole nine. Essentially, everyone including the office dog will need at least some general security training. The good news is that this tends to be a bit less expensive, especially if you choose to outsource your training, as there is no SSI and the requirements are less rigorous.

If you have a scheduler, dispatcher or a flight coordinator, you will also want to make sure these individuals have access to general training. If you are running watch lists, you will need to ensure that your individuals have SSI training.

Flight schools should also make sure that anyone who might have contact with a student or prospective student has participated in general security awareness training. Typically, the obvious groups, such as pilots and most of the office staff are included in training. However, any employee who will potentially interact with a student and should complete training. This applies to everyone from the office worker to the guy who cuts the grass at the airfield, as he could possibly have some contact, albeit minimal, with the student.

You will, in general, want to give everybody that works for you some level of security awareness training. Even at a very general level, this training will introduce your employees to security concepts and activities that they should understand. When it comes to security, you never can over teach. Training takes time but there are reasonable ways to outsource training, such as our program at NATA CS.

If you have any questions, ask in the comments below or shoot me an email! Now that you an understanding of who needs to take aviation security training, we will talk more about ways to make aviation security training cheaper and more efficient in next month's post.