Applications are being accepted for the 2019 Scholarship.

Please submit applications by Friday February 15, 2019

Click here for Application Form

Thank you to flight training colleges and schools for promoting the Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Scholarship among your students. Excellent applications were submitted from a variety of colleges and flight training programs.

Thank you to each applicant for the effort and thought you put into your written submissions. I appreciate the complimentary comments of each referee and hope that applicants realize how highly your instructors and colleagues regard you.

The 2016-17 Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Scholarship of $2000 will be awarded to Claire Orban. Besides graduating from the Seneca College Bachelor of Aviation degree program in 2017 with a Commercial License with a Group 1 Instrument Rating, Claire will write the ATPL exams before beginning her Instructor Rating.

Claire recognizes that students learn at different rates and is committed to taking the required time, and finding alternative ways to help students learn, to give students the best chance to succeed and becoming safe, knowledgeable pilots. Her experience of a wide range of instructing methods and personalities will help shape her into the type of flight instructor she wants to be – fair, firm, and friendly.

She has created a flight instructor assessment tool for students to indicate if they feel that their instructor shows an obvious willingness to help them throughout their training and if they put safety as their number one priority – to ensure a positive safety culture is being passed down.

With her goal of becoming a fair, firm and friendly instructor who will pass along a positive safe flying attitude, Claire is well on her way to becoming the type of instructor exemplified by both Vi Milstead and Arnold Warren 70 – 80 years ago.

Best wishes to all applicants as they prepare for Instructor Ratings and continue to pursue careers in aviation.

Watch for information about the next Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Flight Training Scholarship.
~Marilyn Dickson, Trustee for the Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Flight Training Scholarship

Flight instructors play a vital role in developing pilots’ excellent flying skills and good judgment. This scholarship has been established to celebrate the wonderful work of Canadian flight instructors, and in particular to acknowledge the contributions of two outstanding flight instructors, Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren. Vi Milstead Warren left a legacy in her will for a few flight instructor scholarships. Though the scholarship name celebrates her husband Arnold’s work as well as her own, Vi agreed that with the dearth of female flight instructors, it is appropriate for the award to go to female instructor candidates.

Vi Milstead (1919 – 2014) learned to fly in 1939, just as World War Two was beginning. Within just eight months she earned her Private and Commercial Licenses, while working fulltime in her mother’s, and then in her own woolshop. She then went on to complete her Instructor Rating. She was one of a very few female instructors in Canada in the early 1940s. Though women could not fly with the RCAF, Vi taught many male students who later flew with the RCAF.

In 1943 Vi joined the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) in England and delivered military fighters, bombers and training aircraft throughout the United Kingdom and into continental Europe. For this work she received a unique style of flight training. ATA pilots were trained on one representative plane of each class, and then were expected to fly several other types, without checkouts or any additional training. Vi’s logbook shows 47 different types (74 including different Marks). For example, there were more than 20 different Marks of Spitfires, some with Merlin and others with Griffon engines. The stall speed for different Marks ranged from 66 to 86 mph, with flaps and undercarriage up. It would probably be more realistic to consider that she flew 74 different models of aircraft, than 47.

Following the war Vi returned to instructing, first with Leavens Brothers at Barker Field, then on floats with Nickel Belt Airways in Sudbury and subsequently the Windsor Flying Club.

Arnold Warren (1908 – 2000) learned to fly in Kirkland Lake and Barker Field, Toronto, completing his Private Pilot Licence in 1940. During World War Two he became an instructor with the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, training pilots with the RCAF. Part of his work involved doing research in flight training, with the goal of perfecting the RCAF flight training syllabus. This work formed the basis for his book Let’s Learn To Fly. Following the war he worked as Chief Flight Instructor for Leavens Brothers, where he met Vi. He later claimed he was so impressed with her flying ability he decided to marry her.

After instructing with Nickel Belt Airways, Sudbury and the Windsor Flying Club, through ICAO, Arnold was invited to head up a flight training program inIndonesia. Vi and Arnold lived in Indonesia for two years. Vi was issued an Indonesian pilot licence, but Arnold was not allowed to hire her as an instructor, though the school needed another instructor. After Arnold completed his two year contract, he and Vi returned to Canada. Though they gave up flying professionally, they continued to fly a Piper Cub, and then a Mooney recreationally. Vi and Arnold would hope that successful scholarship winners will enjoy sharing their love of flying as much as they did.

~ By Marilyn Dickson

More About about Vi Milstead Warren

“Folded Wings” Obituary

Scholarship Info

An annual scholarship of $2,000 is intended to contribute to the cost of an Instructor Rating for a female Ontario resident. Applicants may apply for themselves, OR may be nominated by an instructor or another pilot. They must complete the attached application form and a statement of no more than two pages describing the applicant’s personal and professional qualities which would contribute to her becoming an excellent flight instructor. If nominated by someone else, the candidate should also submit a statement re her personal and professional qualities. Applicants or Nominators are also asked to provide names of two referees. The referees need not provide Letters of Reference, but will be contacted about the Applicant.

The ideal scholarship candidate is someone who is likely to be committed to students’ progress, and demonstrates excellent flying ability, a love of flying, as well as good communication skills. Applicants may have already started the Instructor Rating when they apply, or they may apply in advance of beginning the rating.

Click here for Application Form

Applications should be mailed directly to:

The Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Scholarship
313266 Hwy 6,
R.R. 3
Durham, ON
N0G 1R0

or may be e-mailed to vmwscholarship@bell.net

Completed applications must be received by October 27, 2017. The successful applicant will be notified by November 30. The scholarship will be paid directly to the Flight Training Unit, to be applied to the costs of the applicant’s Instructor Rating, upon successful completion of the flight test.

Previous recipients of this scholarship, Veronica Draghici and Nahee Lee have both completed their Instructor Ratings and have been hired as instructors at the Brampton Flying Club. Claire Orban has graduated from the Seneca College Bachelor of Aviation degree program and is currently working on her Instructor  Rating.

Anyone wishing to donate to the Arnold and Vi Milstead Warren Scholarship Fund, and thus extend the number of years it can be offered, may mail a cheque to the above address.