An Indigenous-owned airline, along with other partners, has launched a training program especially for Indigenous students and women, hoping to relieve pilot shortages.
SASKATOON, Sask.-The Mitchison Flight Centre is hosting a Dziret'ái Pilot Training Program designed specifically to train Saskatchewan Indigenous students and women to achieve their goals of becoming pilots.
The program started in September 2024, when 9 of the 105 people who applied were chosen. It is funded by several organizations, including the Indigenous-owned RiseAir airline, mining companies, governments, and First Nations. Because of organizational funding, the program is free for students. Participants also received transportation assistance and accommodation in apartments during the program. Cultural supports are integrated into the program, including the presence of Elders and Knowledge-Keepers in Saskatoon and invitations to participate in events like the FSIN Cultural Celebration
Successful graduates will get their pilot licences in 2026. Once the pilots graduate, they will get to work for RiseAir and continue to learn how to fly different aircrafts.
"They all have had conditional job offers, and of course those are conditional on successfully completing the program," Derek Nice, the RiseAir CEO said.
Nice notes that programs like this can help combat the global pilot shortage, especially in areas like northern Saskatchewan. He says the program is all about supporting local talent and having planes flown by pilots from the north. "We are very much focused on building a pilot workforce that is committed to Saskatchewan," he says.
The airline's CEO Derek Nice told CBC News that said he is happy to support homegrown talent and that having planes flown by pilots from the north is what the program is all about.
"This is going to be transformative for us," Nice told CBC News. "These are some of the best students that have gone through flight training here in Saskatchewan.
"They are Indigenous, but they are representative of the strengths of all youth here in the province. They're making their families proud, their communities proud."
