Pilots: Get up to 55 Liberty Aviation Transfer Credits, Parrillo Tips

Yes, your FAA certificates and ratings can transfer into a Liberty University aviation degree, and for most pilots the number is significant. Liberty's Experience Plus program awards up to 55 credits for existing ratings and allows up to 75% of a B.S. Aviation degree to come from transfer credit. The next step is simple: send your certificates and ratings to eplus@liberty.edu for a formal evaluation before you assume anything about your timeline or cost.

Table of Contents

• What the Experience Plus Program Actually Does
• Which Ratings Convert, and to What
• Submitting Your Training for Credit: A Step-by-Step Process
• Credit Caps, Timelines, and What Won't Transfer
• Mapping Transfer Credit to Your Actual Degree Plan
• Getting Your Training Records Liberty-Ready
• How Parrillo Air Services Fits Into Your Transfer Plan
• Where to Verify These Rules Directly
• Sources
• FAQ

What the Experience Plus Program Actually Does

Experience Plus exists to translate real-world flying into classroom credit. If you already hold an FAA certificate, Liberty doesn't want you sitting through a course that just repeats what you learned in the airplane. The program takes documented licenses and ratings and maps them onto specific AVIA courses in the School of Aeronautics catalog.

It's built for a wider group than most people assume. That includes:

• Civilian pilots with private, instrument, commercial, or CFI ratings earned outside Liberty
• Flight instructors who want teaching hours and certification recognized academically
• Students with relevant military flight training who can document it through official transcripts

The payoff is straightforward: less redundant flight training on campus, a shorter runway to graduation, and in many cases real savings on tuition since you're not paying to relearn material you've already mastered in the cockpit.

Which Ratings Convert, and to What

Liberty doesn't treat every certificate the same way. Some ratings have specific, published AVIA course equivalencies. Others get evaluated case by case. Here's the general pattern the School of Aeronautics follows:

• Private Pilot Certificate usually satisfies foundational AVIA flight courses covering basic maneuvers and single-engine operations.
• Instrument Rating typically maps to Liberty's instrument-specific AVIA coursework, since the FAA training standards overlap closely with what Liberty teaches in that block.
• Commercial Pilot Certificate often lines up with upper-level AVIA credits tied to advanced flight operations.
• CFI and ATP credentials tend to carry the most weight, frequently unlocking the highest-tier AVIA credit available under the program.

Not every rating has a neatly published course number, and Liberty evaluates some submissions individually rather than by formula. One rule catches people off guard: if you already hold a certificate or rating, you generally cannot enroll in the correlating course at Liberty. The credit replaces the class. It doesn't sit alongside it.

Submitting Your Training for Credit: A Step-by-Step Process

Getting your ratings recognized isn't complicated, but skipping a step will cost you weeks in processing delays. Work through it in order.

1. Gather your documentation. Pull your FAA certificates and ratings, official military transcripts if you trained through the armed forces, and any college transcripts from prior coursework.
2. Check Liberty's transfer rules before you submit. Confirm your prior coursework comes from an accredited institution, meets grade minimums, and falls within any applicable age limits on the credit.
3. Send everything to eplus@liberty.edu. Request a formal Experience Plus evaluation, and keep copies of what you sent along with the date.
4. Follow up with the Registrar if you don't hear back within a reasonable window. Evaluations move faster when your paperwork is complete the first time.

Credit Caps, Timelines, and What Won't Transfer

Liberty sets real ceilings on how much outside training can count, and it's worth knowing them before you build a graduation plan around assumptions.

• You can generally transfer in up to 75% of your B.S. Aviation degree, with ratings alone accounting for as many as 55 credits.
• The Registrar's transfer policy requires that prior coursework come from an accredited institution, meet grade minimums (generally a B- or better), and fall within a standard 10-year age limit on transferred credit.
• Military flight training is eligible but typically requires official military transcripts rather than a certificate copy alone.
• International training equivalencies and rotary versus fixed-wing distinctions get handled case by case, so don't assume a helicopter rating converts the same way a fixed-wing certificate does.

Mapping Transfer Credit to Your Actual Degree Plan

Transfer credit doesn't just disappear into a general pool. It satisfies specific AVIA course categories, mostly the flight-training and rating-based courses that overlap with what you already hold.

What it usually doesn't touch is the academic core: aviation law, aerodynamics theory, meteorology, and management coursework still need to be completed through Liberty. Most degree programs also carry residency or capstone requirements that can't be satisfied by outside flight hours, no matter how many ratings you're bringing in.

• Flight-based AVIA courses: high likelihood of transfer credit covering them
• Academic/theory AVIA courses: rarely covered by ratings alone
• Capstone and residency requirements: almost always completed at Liberty regardless of transfer credit

Once your Experience Plus evaluation comes back, sit down with an academic advisor and run a full degree audit. That's the only way to see exactly what's left and build a realistic semester-by-semester plan.

Getting Your Training Records Liberty-Ready

Most pilots lose potential credit not because their flying wasn't good enough, but because their paperwork wasn't. Parrillo Air Services is an FAA-certified flight school, and the way training records get documented from day one directly affects how smoothly a credit petition moves through evaluation later.

A few habits make a real difference when it's time to submit to Experience Plus:

• Keep every signed logbook page, not just a summary total of hours
• Hold onto official copies of each certificate as it's issued, not just the temporary airman certificate
• Collect instructor endorsements in full, with dates and exact regulatory language intact
• Build a short training summary for each rating that lists what was covered and when

Sequencing matters too. If you're planning to pursue a rating that you know Liberty will accept as replacing a specific AVIA course, finishing that rating before you enroll (rather than midway through a semester) avoids the awkward situation of registering for a course you'll later have to drop once your credit clears.

— Gm

How Parrillo Air Services Fits Into Your Transfer Plan

If you're building toward Liberty credit, the training itself matters just as much as the paperwork behind it. A local flight school offers FAA Part 61 instruction in proximity to Liberty's campus, facilitating practical scheduling of flight training around your degree plan.

The Discovery Flight is the natural starting point if you haven't flown yet, priced at $199 as a one-time experience that shows you what the training actually feels like before you commit further. From there, Private Pilot, Instrument Rating, Commercial Pilot, and Flight Instructor Certification training all follow, with aircraft rental running $165 per hour and instruction billed at $55 per hour, detailed on the training fees page. Personalized instruction means your instructor can document each stage clearly, helping ensure your records provide a clean, verifiable story when petitioning Liberty for credit. Reach out through the Parrillo Air Services site to schedule your first flight or ask specifically about credit-transfer documentation support.

Where to Verify These Rules Directly

Confirm every figure here against Liberty's own pages before you make decisions. Start with the Experience Plus program page for submission details, the School of Aeronautics degree page for transfer percentages, and the Registrar's transfer policy page for accreditation and grade rules.

Sources

• Experience Plus – Aviation | Liberty University
• School of Aeronautics | Liberty University

FAQ

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