Comments By Annee

What interesting town names stick in your head. I had a run from "peculiar Mo" to "normal IL".

Just glad I didn't go from normal to peculiar. Although tractor man will say I never left peculiar hahahah

I'll bite.......Weed California (T-shirts @ Weed truck stops are mostly pictures of you-know-what) and Truth or Consequences (don't remember the state, somewhere out West I believe).

So I started class last week, never been in a tractor/trailer before other than a rider twice, I got consistently yelled at about double shifting and not getting the gears. All the while, the trainer was texting and messaging on facebook and barely lifted his head from it. This week I got a different trainer and he made more sense to me, however as I went out on the road yesterday and today, I forgot everything they were telling me or if I remembered, it wasn't good enough or fast enough. This is only my 6th day in the tractor, but today I was given until Friday to get it together... Help!?!

I also had a bad experience at a school, the trainers would yell, threaten or whatever and of course, most of us don't learn like that. I shut down and can't concentrate. I (along with others) left that school as soon as we could. I ended up at a different school that was wonderful and I know have my CDL.

I know your post is over 1 month old, what ended up happening?

Annee, Congratulations! Pay attention, and show an honest effort, and you'll be fine at Roehl. They want you to succeed.

Thanks Old School, appreciate the advice.

Annee, we have about four pages of conversations in our forum tagged with "Roehl Transport" and you can find them here:

Topics Tagged Roehl Transport

Thanks Brett, I plan on reading those tomorrow when I return home.

Thats awesome Annee! Congrats!!!

Brett, I see you live in Attica NY. Is that anywhere near Syracuse? I lived in Liverpool and Baldwinsville many years ago, beautiful country up there.

It is topic 8875 it's titled Keystone Diesel training. I just added my experiences at Roehl on the same post.

Jake, Just finished reading your diary for Roehl and all I can say is wow :) This is exactly the kind of info I was hoping to get here. Thank you, I now have a much better idea on what to expect and I feel so much better. I can do this :)

I went thru the same program it will be ok. The first 8 days is "the interview" but as long as you just relax it will be ok. For the backing part they don't have you parallel or anything really hard it is pretty much a quick review of school with emphasis on the company policies and trip planning and logging. The tight places that they teach you to back into is your basic truck stop parking and you can goal as much as you need to. When I was there one of my class failed the driver skills exam and they just made him redo it in the afternoon. I wrote a review about it but I kinda added it on to my school topic so it's at the end.

Thanks, Jakebreak. I would like to read your review but I can't find it. I've looked through the first 4 and last 4 pages of your comments and searched in the blog section but can't seem to find it. Can you give me a hint where it can be found?

I've been accepted at Roehl (my 1st choice), very happy but also very nervous about the training process. The way I understand it there's 2 phases, the 1st is 8 days which trains you on parking/backing into tight spaces, qualcomm, trip planning/map reading, etc. 2nd phase is OTR with a trainer. My fear is the 1st phase. I seemed to take longer than most people in CDL school to learn backing skills, mostly parallel. I'm afraid I might need more than the 8 days given to learn the alley dock and backing in tight places.

If I'm not ready in 8 days, do they send me home or give me more time?

Hoping there's some Roehl drivers/ex-drivers that could give me a heads up on this part of their training. I'm hesitating on sending the Agreement back because of this.

Thanks in advance for any help given.

Thanks Errol V.

Where is Swifts training hq? I suspect it's Utah since Central was based there.

Oh yeah, Prime won't let me take my own vehicle to travel to Missouri, I have to ride the Greyhound. D'oh! The recruiter told me that there aren't enough parking spaces at the hotel and hq to be able to park my own vehicle. If I go with Prime, does anyone know if theres parking somewhere nearby and then just be able to walk to the hotel/hq?

Seriously considering Swift right now, though.

Does Swift allow travel to their training hq in your own car? Does Swift put you in a hotel? Also, how long before my first paycheck?

My fam just needs to suck it up...

Bean, you are forgiven. Swift is a great company, and could be the second choice if Prime doesn't with out.

"Friends" are advising me against traveling all the way to Missouri. I'm trying hard not to listen to them. I would miss them tremendously, and the recruiter asked me if I and my family are prepared for me leaving, to which I said yes, which was kind of a lie

Missouri if OK. I spent a week there once last year. No problems!

No matter where you go for school, plan to be gone for several months. You get school (4 weeks), then road training (4+ weeks) and then, hopefully, your own truck. Now Prime may let you get home in between those sections, so ask your recruiter about that.

Of course, if you're going OTR you will be driving as long as two weeks to a month between home visits.

I was told the same thing from my recruiter when I went to Prime in MO but because of a bad experience I had on Greyhound, I drove anyway (the recruiter was advised beforehand). When I got there I was surprised on how many empty spaces there were at the hotel so I left it there during my stay. No one noticed or cared. Once on the road I very easily got a sticker to park at Prime HQ. My backup plan for parking while on the road was to leave my car at the hotel. I talked to the front desk, they didn't see a problem with this. Just saying.......

I've always wanted to be on the road for work, I should have done it earlier than now but I'm just looking into some information on what's up. I'd like to get sponsored to go to a school near me or not too far but also start out regional with a day or two at home. ( I live in illinois) there are a few schools very close to me. I wouldn't mind making a trip out to be trained either. I just don't have the money/time to pay bills and go to school without it being paid for or a loan on it.

I also have just recently quit smoking marijuana and don't plan to start back up at all. I was going to buy the shampoo/conditioner clense for the follicle test if required. (i smoked to sleep and calm my anxiety/depression not recreationally) also I take prescribed amphetamines for ADD, would those fail me or would the doctors note suffice to pass? I've also seen a bunch about false positives as well. Is that taken into consideration for a retest or Is it one and done.

I'm a little worried about my family. My wife and I are expecting in December and have a 4 year old now. I would hate like hell to miss the birth, would a company allow me to do short regional trips instead of otr for a bit during that time frame to hopefully not miss it. (still a good chance I know) She says it will be an adjustment but knows we will make it work, I'm a little worried about her anxiety getting the worst of her while I would be out but I know she will call if she needs to talk.

My biggest concerns right now are finding a school that isn't a ripoff ($3.5k 8 wk course is a bit much from what I've read) getting it paid for or finaid loans to pay for it for now. And what I should be watching out for as a newbie I know I'll get screwed somewhere down the road but I tend to learn from others mistakes.

Any and all advice, scare tactics or just stories would help.

Hi Calvin- What part of IL do you live? I know of a few counties in IL (Will, duPage, Cook) that have grants to attend trucking school. You would be required to attend a 2 week class before they'll sponsor you and I believe you have to financially qualify, but it's worth looking into. If you're interested send me a message and I'll forward the info to you.

I just graduated from a school in Shorewood which I highly recommend. I tried two schools before going to this one and was unhappy with the way students were treated and the overcrowding, in one I probably drove about 15 minutes every 3rd day and forget about skills - they had 19 people for one truck for a while so as you can imagine, didn't get much skill time.

Also, you might want to wait longer before taking the drug test. If you should fail, is that now on your record? I wouldn't want to take that chance. And those shampoos do not work, don't waste your money.