Amy Hoover was named the 2022 National Flight Instructor of the Year. Dr. Hoover comes from a background in general aviation, corporate aviation, and aviation education at the Community College and University levels. Her administrative experience includes Chief Instructor and operator of FAA 141 flight schools, owner of her own flight school, Aviation Program Director and Department Chair at institutions in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington.  She served two elected terms as Department Chair for CWU Aviation from September 2007 through June 2015 and now teaches full time in the department. She achieved the rank of Full Professor in 2012.

Dr. Hoover has over 7000 flight hours, including 3500 hours giving flight instruction. She has logged over 1200 hours of instruction time in flight simulators. Her journey into Aviation started in the early 1980s when her work as a geologist and white water river guide entailed flights into the remote river canyons in central Idaho; she has been hooked ever since.  Hoover obtained her private license in 1989 in Salmon, Idaho, and bought a 1947 Cessna 120, which she flew from Idaho to Florida and back, stopping over for the winter to obtain her instrument rating, commercial pilot license, and flight instructor rating. In 1992, she landed a job as a backcountry Air Taxi pilot and began teaching mountain flying for the FAA. 

Hoover received the Amelia Earhart Scholarship from the International 99’s in 1994, which she used to complete her multi-engine commercial rating. She combined her love of flying with that of teaching and began work as a full-time flight instructor in 1995. Hoover is one of the three original co-founders of McCall Mountain/Canyon Flying Seminars in McCall, Idaho, where she spent 4 years developing the curriculum and creating the company’s training materials. Realizing her desire to reach out to a broader spectrum in aviation training, Hoover took the position as Director of Aviation at Mt. Hood Community College in Oregon, before joining the faculty at Central Washington University.

Dale Wilson joined the faculty in the Department of Aviation at CWU in September 1996 and retired from full-time service in April 2020. Prior to this, he taught for thirteen years at the Institute of Aviation at Trinity Western University in Canada, where as a Class 1 Flight Instructor he provided academic instruction and flight training to private, commercial, multi-engine, and flight instructor pilot candidates.  He also provided training in mountain flying and tail-wheel operations. He has over 3,600 flight hours, and holds Airline Transport Pilot certification in the United States and Canada as well as FAA-certified flight and ground instructor certificates.

His formal education includes a Master's degree in Aviation Safety and a Bachelor's degree in Psychology (human performance emphasis).  His passion is aviation safety. To that end he teaches courses dealing with flight crew physiology, psychology, and safety; aviation safety management; and aviation weather. Since his arrival at CWU he has published several safety articles and presented papers at national and international conferences on the visual limitations of flight and the problem of VFR flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC).  See list of publications and links below.