Matt Wilkins

Matt Wilkins is the co-founder and COO of Hawkins Flight Academy, operating at Shelbyville Municipal Airport (KSYI) in Shelbyville, Tennessee and Tupelo Regional Airport (KTUP) in Tupelo, Mississippi. In two and a half years of operation, Hawkins has maintained a 0% student dropout rate against an industry average of 80%—every student who has enrolled in a Hawkins program has completed it. In 2026, the school was named a Distinguished Flight School by the AOPA Foundation, an award determined entirely by verified student reviews.

Background

Matt’s path to flight school ownership runs directly through the problem he built Hawkins to solve. He started his private pilot at Auburn University in 2007, earned his license, began instrument training, and then quit. The cost was too high and the financial path forward was unclear. He became part of the 80% who start flight training and never finish, and did not fly again professionally for ten years.

He grew up in Madison, Alabama, outside Huntsville, where his family heard NASA solid rocket booster tests from their house. His great-great grandfather worked alongside Glenn Curtiss—one of the founding figures of American aviation—a connection Matt traces to a museum in Hammondsport, New York near the Finger Lakes that he has visited every summer since childhood.

His return to aviation came in 2017 through an avionics sales rep job in Nashville, which he landed without industry experience through direct networking. That role eventually led to the conversations with co-founder Mike Harris that produced Hawkins Flight Academy.

Building Hawkins Flight Academy

Before opening, Matt and co-founder Mike Harris spent months interviewing flight school owners and students across the country asking two questions: what did you like about your flight school, and what did you not like? Every structural decision at Hawkins—pricing model, fleet selection, maintenance approach, and culture—came from those answers.

Hawkins launched in 2022 from a used travel trailer parked on a gravel road at Shelbyville Municipal Airport. The location was deliberate: Matt and Mike identified that Middle Tennessee State University, one of the largest Part 141 programs in the country, had announced plans to relocate its operation to Shelbyville, and moved first. From that travel trailer start, Hawkins has grown to:

• 13 aircraft across two locations
• 3,000+ sq ft of office and training space, including a full-motion simulator
• 9 Van’s RV-12iSTs—the largest RV-12 training fleet in the United States
• Programs from Private Pilot through CFI, CFII, and MEI
• A Professional Pilot Program taking students from zero experience to Certified Flight Instructor

Program-Based Training Model

The Hawkins answer to the industry’s 80% dropout problem is program-based training. Students enroll in a fixed-price program rather than paying by the Hobbs meter:

• Professional Pilot Package 1: $74,995 — Private Pilot through Multi-Engine Rating
• Professional Pilot Package 2: $89,995 — adds CFI, CFII, and MEI
• Ground School: $499.99 for a 14-week in-person course
• Financing: Stratus Financial and AOPA Finance (lines of credit up to $100,000)

Matt’s position on what this model changes: it is not just a pricing structure—it is a completely different training mindset. When a student knows the total cost and has committed to a program, the ambiguity that drives 80% attrition in the traditional model is removed.

The RV-12 Fleet

The core Hawkins training fleet is built around Van’s RV-12iST Special Light Sport Aircraft—a choice that separates Hawkins from nearly every other flight school in the Southeast:

• 9 RV-12iSTs: Largest RV-12 training fleet in the country
• Garmin G3X glass cockpits and GFC 500 autopilot standard on every aircraft
• 3.1 gallons per hour fuel burn vs. 9–10 gph for a Cessna 172—a significant cost-per-hour difference compounded across a full fleet
• Rotax 912 engine: Lower maintenance costs compared to Lycoming or Continental engines
• Fleet commonality: All nine aircraft are factory-built to the same specification with identical avionics—any aircraft is interchangeable for any student, eliminating the scheduling disruption that comes with a mixed fleet
• Also on fleet: Piper Cherokee 140, Cessna 172, Vector Harmony, and a Piper Aztec for multi-engine training at each location

Matt keeps the Cherokee and 172 specifically so students complete training in certificated aircraft and understand how legacy equipment flies—the RV-12 doesn’t replace them, it handles the bulk of the program.

Areas of Expertise

• Flight School Operations: Built a two-location, 13-aircraft school from a travel trailer start in under three years
• Program-Based Pricing: Designed and refined the fixed-price training model that produced Hawkins’s 0% dropout rate
• Light Sport Aircraft Training: Deep operational knowledge of the RV-12 platform and its economics as a primary trainer
• Fleet Management: Expert in fleet commonality strategy and its downstream benefits for student experience and maintenance scheduling
• Student Retention: Understands the financial, cultural, and structural factors that keep students progressing through training to completion
• FAA Mosaic Rulemaking: Closely tracks the regulatory changes expected to expand light sport aircraft IMC capability and their implications for flight school fleet planning
• Aviation Financing Advocacy: Actively working with Tennessee state legislators to open the Tennessee Promise scholarship and loan program to flight training students

Adventure Flights

When Hawkins takes delivery of a new RV-12 from the Van’s Aircraft factory in Aurora, Oregon, they fly it back—by way of the California coast, Las Vegas, the Grand Canyon, and Sedona. These factory pickup flights became a formal part of Hawkins culture under the name Adventure Flights. Instructors and students also fly to Sun ‘n Fun, Oshkosh, over Niagara Falls, and to destinations like Lambert’s Cafe in Sikeston, Missouri. Matt’s view: a student grinding through commercial hours without ever flying somewhere worth going is a student at risk of burning out. Fun flying is not a distraction from the program—it is part of what keeps students in it.