The Federal Aviation Administration just hit a major hiring milestone, and their new recruits did not come from aviation school.

In April, the Department of Transportation launched a campaign aimed squarely at video gamers, targeting platforms like Fortnite and Roblox to find candidates for one of the most high pressure jobs in the country. The pitch was simple. The same skills gamers build for fun, like multitasking, spatial awareness, and quick decision making under pressure, translate directly to guiding real planes through the sky.

It worked. As of this week, the FAA has hired more than 2,000 gamers as air traffic controllers, reaching 94 percent of its hiring goal faster than any class in the agency’s history.

The push comes as the country faces a serious controller shortage. The US currently has around 11,000 active air traffic controllers, but staffing has dropped roughly 6 percent over the past decade while flight volume has climbed 10 percent. The agency says it is still thousands of controllers short of its target levels.

To speed things up, the government raised starting pay by 30 percent and streamlined the hiring process so qualified applicants move through faster than ever before.

Getting hired is only step one. Candidates still have to pass a background check, medical exam, drug test, psychological evaluation, and a nearly four-hour cognitive skills test before even reaching the FAA Academy. From there, training takes one to three years, and historically only about 2 percent of applicants make it all the way to certification.

For thousands of young gamers, all those hours at the controller were apparently not wasted after all.

Submitted by Dubuque Esports League – 3220 Dodge St., Dubuque, IA