[airplane engine roaring]
[twangy electric guitar]
- Susan Schwaab: When you're up in the air and you're flying,
you don't think about anything else.
You're just flying.
It's what you're doing and right where you are.
And that's a beautiful feeling.
So, there's a whole host of things
that make flying pretty amazing.
- Fareed Guyot: So, you see the emergency exits?
Camp Willa is a program of the Willa Brown Aviation Academy.
It is a five-day day camp during the summer
where we introduce kids,
mostly from underserved and underrepresented communities,
to aviation,
and all the possibilities, from just being an enthusiast,
enjoying aviation, maybe being a recreational pilot,
all the way up to making it a career option.
[upbeat music]
- Right now, female airline pilots are 6%
of the airline pilot crew.
Pilots of color are 3%.
And it's just such an awesome job.
I never knew about it, you know, as a girl.
I didn't grow up working on cars and being around airplanes.
Until I met someone that took me flying,
it never occurred to me.
So, that's what we want.
We want them to just know it's out there.
When you get your flight,
you'll see the world from a totally different perspective.
- We have somewhere between 18 to 22 campers,
and this is our third year.
So we give 'em presentations about aerodynamics
and even the lights they see at the airport.
And then we take 'em on a one-on-one airplane ride
toward the end of the week, and they're just like,
"Man, this is awesome!
I never thought of this before."
And that's pretty much the same comment.
- Student: I thought I would never do this,
but as y'all can see,
I'm gonna fly this little whatever, plane, jet, whatever this is.
I'm gonna fly it today and we gonna have a fun time, right?
- Fareed Guyot: That's right.
When they come back from that flight,
we want to see that "post-flight grin," as I call it.
And a lot of people say that they just love that "aviator grin."
They're like, "Oh, that was great."
- Whew, we did it. [laughs] - Yay.
- Susan Schwaab: I think they have the feeling
that if they can fly an airplane, what else can they do?
You know, that's the goal of the camp.
To just show them the opportunities that are out there
to give them confidence
and also to talk to 'em about what it takes,
the discipline and the schooling.
So, all of that, it's just a nice package.
And this is called the pitot tube.
If you fall in love with this and you love it, do it.
It's gonna be a lot of work.
It's gonna be hard.
It's gonna take quite a long time.
Don't do it for the money.
Don't do it for the glamour. [chuckles]
But do it because you have a passion for it.
- You're doing great.
Would you like to try a turn?
I'm a flight instructor, and I just want to teach
as many people as possible about flying,
whether they wanna fly
or just about flying and aviation
and how crucial it is to our economy,
but also just how enjoyable it is
and the community around us is fun.
[airplane engine roars]