Cars all over the streets of tehran. Who is living the high life will surprise you. Im adam shapiro. Im Catherine Herridge. And this is fox files. Each day almost 2 million americans take to the skies. And all depend on aviation professionals to get home safely. Hello, im adam shapiro. Air Traffic Controllers, those eyes in the towers are key to this. But new hiring practices by the federal Aviation Administration have called into question if the best most qualified people will be working in the towers. Moreover there are accusations of cheating to get the controller jobs. Will you be safe aboard an airplane . Or is there trouble in americas skies . Theyve been called the guardians of the skies. Good morning. Americas air Traffic Controllers manage the safe takeoff and landings more than 87,000 flights a day. Its been called one of the most demanding and stressful jobs in the u. S. 93 go ahead. Never would the importance of what controllers do more apparent than on september 11th 2001. Another one just hit the building. Wow. Controllers scramble to determine which of the thousands of planes on their radar screens had become guided missiles. They also tackled the tremendous logistics of landing 4,000 planes within a few hours. New type of war. Today, the federal Aviation Administration or faa, the Government Agency responsible for air Traffic Control, faces a new crisis. Probably in the next one to three years were going to see some real problems. Doug williams is Program Director of the aviation collegiate Training Initiative or cti program, at the Community College of Baltimore County maryland. Its one of 36 cti schools established by the faa across the u. S. Offering two and fouryear degrees in air Traffic Control. Cti Program Brings in people that are genuinely interested in air Traffic Control. It gives them the skills that are required to be an air Traffic Controller. The faa faces an acute shortage of qualified air Traffic Controllers. Required to retire at the age 56. The faa estimates it needs to hire 1,000 controllers a year for the next ten years to keep air traffic moving safely. The faa actually created the cti program in the early 90s anticipating the retirement. They saw the shortage that was coming. Uhhuh. But williams says recent faa hiring changes are making the problem worse. Fox business brought together six recent cti graduates, all of whom had one dream, to serve the nation in a control tower. Ryan becker grew up around air Traffic Controllers. Your dads an air Traffic Controller. He was. He just retire edd. Ben albany served anyone years in the air force. I directed fighter intercepts from the nato airlines. I love this industry. I love airplanes. Miranda rilely found her lifes passion early. I think its fascinating. This industry is a unique one. Matthew douglas visited a control tower in his native seattle, washington. He was hooked instantly. I like maps. I like spatial information. Its a way to contribute to the community. And make sure everyone gets home safely. I quit a job at google maps to go to school in anchorage, alaska. I made the 2,500mile drive by myself and my dog. My father and grandfather pilots of varying degrees. Lucas johnson grew up around aviation. Air shows, tower tours, ever since i was little. And arianna found her calling in college. I started my sophomore year in aviation because it fit my personality. To pursue a career as air Traffic Controllers, all six entered cti programs. It was the established way to get into air Traffic Control. You go to faa. Gov and its apply to cti school. So thats what i did. After ggraduating the next hurdle was the air traffic selection and training exam. Its an Aptitude Test administered by the faa. Actual control scenarios, games that test your ability to multitask are all skills essential to this job. So was it your understanding that it was the test. It was the test. As i understand it its a zero to 100 score. 85 to 100 is well qualified. Tell me what your score was the last time you took it . I got a 94. Matthew . My score was 100. 93. 6. 85. 100. 86. All achieved the wellqualified status on this crucial test. In late 2013 they were confident they would be hired by the faa to become certified professional controllers, or cpcs. It made sense. The faa always gave hiring preference to cti grads with the highest scores on the test. I had two degrees. I finished my air Traffic Control program with a 4. 0 and i interned for the faa. I think i had a decent chance absolutely. Ben, you had this really high score on the test youre a veteran, which theyre required to actually seek people like you out. What were you thinking say in november of 2013 as the 2014 job bids were about to be announced . I was excited to get the ball rolling. But out of nowhere on december 30th 2013 the faa suddenly informed cti schools and then thousands of their graduates it was completely changing the hiring process. We learned about it in a letter that we received on december 30th 2013 from the faa explaining that they were no longer going to give hiring preference to cti graduates. After years of study, and for many thousands of dollars in Student Loan Debt cti graduates had to start all over. Everything they had worked for was deemed irrelevant. Not only was preferential consideration for their degrees discarded, even the test that crucial Aptitude Test would no longer be a primary requirement. Instead, the faa introduced a socalled buy graphical eded biographical questionnaire. And in february 2014 thousands took this new test. Let me read some of the questions from that test. What has been the major cause of your failures . A question that everyone seems to love is question number 21 in which they ask, the number of different High School Sports i participated in was. And these are multiple choice questions. What did you think . How does this relate to the job . How does this determine whats going to make a successful account . And then what happened . I got an email saying i was not qualified. Anyone else get that email . Sure did. These six and thousands of other wellqualified cti graduates were deemed ineligible. Howd you feel lucas . Just kind of crushed. Lost. You know what am i supposed to do . It breaks your heart to work so hard for something. And for someone to say that youre not legible because of a personality exam. I dont understand how people were not able to proceed. Coming up. There are some valuable pieces of information that i have taken a screen shot of and im going to send that to you via email. Did someone have the answers to the test . That is absolutely sickening. That is cheating. You total your brand new car. Nobodys hurt,but there will still be pain. It comes when your Insurance Company says theyll only pay threequarters of what it takes to replace it. What are you supposed to do, drive threequarters of a car . Now if you had Liberty Mutual new car replacement, youd get your whole car back. I guess they dont want you driving around on three wheels. Smart. With Liberty Mutual new car replacement, well replace the full value of your car. See Car Insurance in a whole new light. Liberty mutual insurance. In february 2014 thousands of graduates of air Traffic Control schools learned their dreams had been crushed. The primary path to a job in americas towers a path established years before by the faa, was suddenly abandoned. Their degrees were now irrelevant. Scores on the atsat test ignored. Worse, the grads had been deemed ineligible to become controllers. Why . A murky and strange biographical Personality Test newly implemented by the faa to select candidates. Theres no information for us to understand how we can improve or what we can focus onto make ourselves a better candidate. Anybody ever say what made you eligible or not eligible . Weve asked that question also. And members of congress have asked the faa. The faa made some very dramatic changes to the way theyre hiring our air Traffic Controllers. Nobody understands what this biographical questionnaire is evaluating. Ill have from the faa reach out directly to you. This to me is really troubling. Let me read to you what the faa says. This test has been proven to be a valid for experiencing work habits and education dimensions related to work success on the job. And yet just a month later the faa published a different conflicting report titled using biodata to select air Traffic Controllers. It says we conclude that the evidence for using these biodata items for controller selection is weak. Makes no sense. Wheres the logic behind it . If its weak why would you use it . By all accounts whats driving these changes in hiring of air Traffic Controllers is a program to promote diversity in the nations control towers. Diversitys a noble goal. Im not going to sit here and deny that. It generates a better atmosphere when you have people from different backgrounds. And i completely agree with it. Back in 2013 the faa office of civil rights published a massive Barrier Analysis on the impediments or barriers for minorities. It states the first steps of the original hiring process are the most likely places for systematic adverse impact because these steps are responsible for the vast majority of fails. It also says the cti program is much less diverse than off the street hires. The Barrier Analysis. Right. Concluded that youre not diverse. We had completed a diversity study, which showed that we were showing significant progress in helping the diversity within the faa air Traffic Controller ranks. Lucas, are you africanamerican . Yeah. They threw you away. Either theyve got enough africanamericans or they dont really know what they want. Matthew, youre native american right . Correct. Miranda . Female what do you think . I think that they had a goal and they went about it the wrong way. A former air Traffic Controller himself, mike pearson now works as an aviation lawyer. Its my belief that the faa is engaged in a pattern of discrimination and now theyre covering it up. Pearson and others believe diversity advocates strong arm the faa into changing its hiring practices. You had social engineering in my belief my opinion, going on. It was driven by two arms of the faa, two different organizations. One was the Human Resources group. And i believe there was another group engaging in what i believe is discrimination against qualified candidates. What is that organization . The nbc excuse me National Black correlation of aviation employees. The coalition is an Umbrella Group for various minorities. Anybody considered a minority can join. The mbcfae had formed a team now theyre certainly allowed to advocate for their group. Thats legal. The one thing theyre not allowed to do is advocate a group at the exclusion of another group. Pearson suspects the faa abandoned the program and threw away kwfred and welltrained graduates to bring in off the street hires and that way achieve greater diversity. Social engineering at the risk of compromising safety. But theres more. The advocacy on the part of nbcfae appears to go far beyond a change in hiring practices. Fox business obtained a troubling recording made by an fae employee, whos also an nbcfae executive. Id like to play something for you. Associate members, listen. I know each of you are eager, very eager to apply for this job vacancy announcement. And trust after tonight you will be able to do so. It was sent as an audio text to certain applicants who were already members of the organization. Allow me to go to work and come home provide you with an email that will be extremely crucial in the opening stages of this hiring process. There is some valuable pieces of information that i have taken a screen shot of. And im going to send that to you via email. Im about 99. 99 sure that its exactly how you need to answer each question in order to get through the first phase. Utterly disgusting. Just handing out the answers. Thats absolutely sickening. That is cheating at the most unacceptable highest level that ive ever seen right there. Pure and simple cheating. Coming up. Its my belief that the faa is hiding the truth. There are people from the nbcfae who say you gave them the answers on the test. Who do i speak to about this . No comment. In 2014 an audio text message was sent to certain members of the National Black coalition of federal aviation employees. Im going to send it directly to you because its exactly how you need to answer each question in order to get through the first phase. The audio text suggests cheating took place on the Entrance Exam to become an faa air Traffic Controller. You looked very upset as you heard that. I put a lot of effort into this and i havent even gotten a chance. And it sounds like someone gets an email and then they get their chance. Seems very unfair very unjust. And utterly disgusting. Beginning of the faa theres a disclaimer asking you not to share the answers to the test and the questions. And theyve gone and done the opposite. No. Why not . Because i received that voicemail. Why do you want to talk about it . I joined the nbcfae. And when i saw what was going on i knew that i had to stand on the right side of the fence. Though miranda did receive the audio text and the subsequent email with screen shots, she says she did not cheat on the biographical questionnaire. I believe the flying public has a right to know this is going on. I believe the people engaged in this behavior need to be held accountable. We contacted shelton snow the faa employee who sent the text and invited him to be interviewed. But he refused. So we tracked him down in washington, d. C. How are you doing, mr. Snow . Its a simple question i want to ask you why you gave the answers to the students of your test . We had members of the nbcfae said you gave them answers to the biographical questionnaire. He continued to avoid answering our questions. But there are people from the nbcfae who says you gave them answers to the questions on the test. Who do i speak to about this . No comment. Is there they say you gave them the answers. Im just trying to find out if thats true or not. We also contacted the president of the nbcfae. And shes not returned our calls. The faa has said that the cti Program Failed to produce Better Qualified candidates than people right off the street. But fox business obtained an unpublished fae draft document from october 2014 titled studies of next Generation AirTraffic Control specialists. Which directly contradicts this. And heres the actual quote. Overall larger proportions of vra, thats the vets and cti hires achieved certified professional controller status than did general public hires. Theyre saying that the cti Program Benefits the taxpayers, benefits the flying public. Why wont the faa make this public . Its my belief that the faa is engaged in a continual game of hiding the truth, hiding information. From the public on this. Theres numerous congressmen involved in this. So we went to capitol hill. There we spoke to illinois congressman. There is a debate within the faa that the cti programs which they created were being pushed aside for people being hired off the street. And what the faa is saying is that people off the street are just as qualified as people whove gone through cti. I just fundamentally disagree with that. You might get lucky finding a few people qualified and able to do this but again, what ive seen from cti programs youve got passionate people willing to commit themselves to become qualified to be able to serve in these jobs. Congressman is a cosponsor of the air Traffic Controllers hiring act of 2015. The biggest objective is to make sure our air travel is the safest in the world and making sure we have the most qualified people serving as air Traffic Controllers. We played the audio text for him. Its exactly how you need to answer each question. Sounds like cheating. Sounds like someone inside getting information out to people. Very concerning. Since this report first aired, washington has taken notice. The house aviation subcommittee on capitol hill as well as the national air Traffic Controllers association have demanded answers from the faa. Aviation subcommittee chairman Frank Lobiondo commented on the faa scandal. The chairman of the committee and i sent a letter to the inspector general. We got a response that because of our request they will be investigating this. Though the faa has refused to speak with us we were able to reach Joseph TeixeiraVice President of safety and Technical Training about the testing and cheating scandals. He said and this is a quote, its not my area of expertise.