How the Course Works

AOS 152: Weather for Pilots is web based course offered by the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (AOS 152). This course is an applied meteorology course designed primarily for pilots and student pilots. The goal of the course is to provide a learning opportunity for those interested in studying advanced aviation-weather topics. It is designed to review and extend a pilot’s background in meteorology. In addition to covering basic principles of meteorology, the course highlights the weather problems with which you can be faced as a pilot.

The course requires a web browser that is Java enabled.

The course book is Aviation Weather, 2nd edition by Peter F. Lester. Published by Jeppesen (www.jeppesen.com)(ISBN 0-88487-273-4).

Weather for Pilots includes many interactive exercises that teach you how to read weather maps, how to interpret satellite images, and help you understand why and how different weather occur.

My email address is saackerm@facstaff.wisc.edu I usually check my email for this course in the evening. All email correspondence should go to that email address. Jessica Staude, jastaude@wisc.edu, is the TA for the course and all assignments should be emailed to her.

A new lesson will be posted each week and you will have about a week to complete the assignment--you can submit the assignment anytime during the week. The learning objective of each lesson is clearly described at the beginning of the lesson. In addition to the reading, there are practice sessions to help you study for the assignment. All assignments will be submitted over the web, and must be submitted before the due date or they will not be recorded, and therefore not count.

With regard to grading. Each assignment will be worth a certain amount of points, which will be listed with the assignment. You accumulate points towards a final grade. Typically, the grades are based on the percentage of points accumulated:

A       92%
AB     88%
B       82%
BC     78%
C       70%
D       60%

Around the second or third week you will be able to check how you are doing over the web, with the following link.