Gifts for student pilots

The steps below come from the CAA's page on the private pilot licence for aeroplanes, read on 30 September 2026. The hours are on the gifts for pilots page. This page covers the rest of what a student is doing, because it tells you when a gift is likely to land.

What does a student pilot have to complete?

Training has to be done at an Approved Training Organisation or a Declared Training Organisation, so the school is part of the licence rather than a choice of venue. The CAA gives the minimum age for the licence as 17, and says the student needs a Part-MED Class 2 medical certificate.

The theory is nine subject areas. Five are common to every category of pilot: air law, human performance, meteorology, communications and navigation. Four are specific to the aircraft category: principles of flight, operational procedures, flight performance and planning, and aircraft general knowledge.

Passed theory exams are valid for 24 months from the date of the last one. Within those 24 months the student has to finish the flight training and pass the skill test, or the exams expire and have to be retaken. So the last stretch of training is a bounded run, not an open-ended one.

At the end comes a skill test with an examiner. The student doesn't book it: the CAA says the flying school does that "when they feel you are ready".

How long does a student's medical last?

In Part-MED, at MED.A.045 in Annex IV of Regulation (EU) No 1178/2011 as it applies in the UK, a Class 2 certificate is valid for 60 months until the holder reaches 40, and a certificate issued before 40 stops being valid after 42. Between 40 and 50 it is valid for 24 months, and above 50 for 12. A student who starts training at 45 is therefore on a shorter cycle than one who starts at 19.

Which print goes with which stage?

The training field. A student spends most of the course at one airfield. The airport code print is its code, with the name, country and position beneath. It starts from a code, so look up the school's field in the lookup, which includes UK airfields that have a four-letter ICAO code.

The aircraft they learn in. A photograph of it, from the club or from the day, can be printed as it was taken, with every size checked against the file before you pay.

The day of the skill test. There isn't a print for passing an exam, and a photograph from that day is the thing to print. The school books the test, so the date is worth asking the school for.

What this page leaves out

Headsets, books and flight bags aren't here. We don't sell them and we haven't sourced advice on which to buy, so we don't give any. A student's school is the place to ask what they are missing.

For a pilot at the other end of a career, pilot retirement gifts starts from the rules for the last commercial flight. Aviation gifts covers every other recipient.