Students Can Now Fly Drones At School, FAA Says (buzzfeed.com)

An anonymous reader writes: It will now be easier for students to pilot drones as part of their schoolwork, thanks to new Federal Aviation Administration rules that exempt high schools and colleges from the more stringent aircraft regulations placed on businesses. In a memo released Wednesday outlining the new guidelines, federal regulators have designated drone schoolwork as a hobby or recreational -- as opposed to commercial -- activity, allowing students for the first time to fly unmanned aircraft without a pilot's license or special authorization from the government. "Schools and universities are incubators for tomorrow's great ideas, and we think this is going to be a significant shot in the arm for innovation," said FAA Administrator Michael Huerta during a drone conference in New Orleans. But the agency's policy prohibits teachers from being the primary operators of unmanned aircraft, because they are paid for their work and therefore "would not be engaging in a hobby or recreational activity" while flying a drone. (They can, however, pilot drones in a limited way -- in case of emergency, for instance.)

Comments

Re:Simple question

[SecurityGuy]

Learning about aeronautics?

Learning about technology?

Inspiring interest in either of the above, or any related field?

Learning in general?

I learned how to shoot a bow and arrow in middle school. I learned how to paint and draw (badly). I learned about music I don't especially like written by dead people hundreds of years ago. I wrote reports about books written by dead Russians. None of it was useful to me, though archery was fun, but some people go on to be artists, musicians, writers, etc.

Part of the point of primary education is to show people a lot of doors so they'll see what options exist. This is far from the most useless subjects to be pursued in a school.