Definition
The flight instructor's ongoing responsibility to oversee a student pilot's flying activities -- including solo flights -- by directing, monitoring, and guiding the student's training, decisions, and conduct to ensure safety and proper progress.
Plain English
The instructor stays responsible for what the student does in the airplane. Even when the student flies alone, the instructor decides whether the student is ready, sets limits on what they can do, and keeps watch over their training.
Context Anchor
Seen in flight instructor responsibilities, especially when discussing student solo flights, training limits, and instructor approvals.
Derivation
From Latin 'super-' (over) and 'videre' (to see) -- literally 'to oversee.' In aviation, the instructor 'sees over' the student's flying, even when not physically present in the cockpit.
Why Pilots Care
It maintains training safety and fulfills regulatory requirements for instructor oversight of student operations.
Grounding Statement
In this context, supervision can mean active oversight and approval from the instructor, not only direct watching from the right seat.
Intuition Check
Do not assume pilot supervision means the instructor must always be physically present in the airplane. In flight training, it can also mean the instructor controls what the pilot is approved to do, under what conditions, and when.
Example Sentence 1
Under the instructor's pilot supervision, the student was cleared for solo flight only in the local practice area and only when winds were below 10 knots.
Example Sentence 2
The CFI documented pilot supervision for every training flight the student conducted without an instructor on board.