Extra fun ideas for senior member meetings?

[thenick]

So what do all of you do to help keep your senior members interested and attending the weekly meeting? I know CAP has the usual ES, cadet mentoring, CAP business stuff that gets done, but is there anything you do for special activities to keep the meetings themselves more interesting?

A little background: We are a decent sized composite squadron with great cadet senior leadership. The rest of the senior members not directly involved with the cadets are a mixture of pilots and other people. I think our pilots probably have the aerospace topics mastered pretty well so I'm looking to maintain a good balance of "getting CAP stuff done" and not sitting around all night talking about whatever. Too much of either is rather boring. I'd like to spice it up a bit more than it is.

Discuss....

[vmstan]

One of the guys in our squadron played Missile Command (think old school Atari) for a while on his laptop on Tuesday. When one of the Captains walked in and asked what he was doing I told him it was an Air Force training exercise.

[Eclipse]

The whole point of them being there is the staff work and training.

If the work is done, and the training is current, cancel the meeting.  This is not like the military in that we own people 24x7 and they need a relief valve.  They are coming to CAP as a relief.

This is akin to cadets who think they need a party to relieve the "pressure" of an encampment.

The environment you establish should be productive and fun enough that overt "fun" isn't necessary.  I don't know too many seniors
who would want to make the effort to come to a meeting where there wasn't CAP business to attend to.

Send people home, or don't drag them out.

[Spike]

This is akin to cadets who think they need a party to relieve the "pressure" of an encampment.

You have this happen in your Wing too?!?  There are staff parties that move to one house after another after Encampment.  About 15 years ago a relatively large Wing was part of a lawsuit regarding a Cadet's death after drinking at an underage party that was composed of staff cadets and held in a private residence the day after Encampment ended.  The suit was frivolous, but retaliation by the Wing was not.

I will not go into details, I will save those for the legal officers to share.

I agree if there is so much down time at a meeting, it should be cancelled or at least new projects started.

[RiverAux]

No reason to have weekly meetings for seniors.  Go to twice a month.

[TACP]

No reason to have weekly meetings for seniors.  Go to twice a month.

AMEN

I'm completely for the once or twice a month Senior meetings. Members are more likely to show up and don't have to constantly be deconflicting their schedules. Besides, there really isn't a reason to have Seniors there every week unless they're working with the cadets.

[Eclipse]

No reason to have weekly meetings for seniors.  Go to twice a month.

There I disagree - that's a great way to lose or never have momentum.

[TACP]

No reason to have weekly meetings for seniors.  Go to twice a month.

There I disagree - that's a great way to lose or never have momentum.

On the contrary! I've been in a squadron that held Senior Meetings once a month, and two others that held them every week. On average, the once a month had a 90%+ showing every time, and got a heck of a lot more done. The other two rarely ever saw their seniors, and it was a sporatic and unorganized showing.

Works better when you have Seniors show up that first monday and talk about training and the upcomming month events. It keep their schedules free, doesn't burn them out, and keeps the chance of being able to set aside 1 day rather than 4 much higher.

[arajca]

First thing to do is see what YOUR members are interested in. I recommend having a seniors only meeting for this.

Then find ways to make it enjoyable (or more enjoyable).

[Eclipse]

On the contrary! I've been in a squadron that held Senior Meetings once a month, and two others that held them every week. On average, the once a month had a 90%+ showing every time, and got a heck of a lot more done. The other two rarely ever saw their seniors, and it was a sporatic and unorganized showing.

Works better when you have Seniors show up that first monday and talk about training and the upcomming month events. It keep their schedules free, doesn't burn them out, and keeps the chance of being able to set aside 1 day rather than 4 much higher.

If you're only meeting once a month, what are you "discussing"?  Sounds like you were doing plenty, just forgoing the weekly meetings, that's different.  I know too many units where they meet twice a month (unless they miss one), then take a hiatus over the holidays and
every Jan wonder why nothing is getting done or moving forward.

The members need to be actively and regularly engaged, how that happens doesn't matter, but its hard to do anything on 4 hours a month.

[Al Sayre]

Our Seniors meet officially once a month on a Non-Cadet night, where we address our required Senior only stuff like PD, more technical Arerospace discussions, Safety etc.  However, they are also welcome to come to the Cadet meetings and many of them do and use that time to get their other duties done and I have more free time availble to spend with them on their issues.

[vento]

I am in a Senior only squadron and we meet twice a month. We get everything that needs to be accomplished done, execute successful SAREX, and have one of the highest flght time in the Group. Other than meetings, the CC also utilizes email effectively to communicate. We also have a party or two every year where family members get to know each other.

[Spike]

My Composite Squadron is "integrated".  We all work together.  Just because you are not "Cadet Age", does not mean you will not benefit from the Cadet material and vice-versa.  When Cadets have to do SDA's does your respective Senior Member Officer come to a Cadet meeting to meet with the Cadet or does the cadet go to a Senior only meeting? 

Composite Squadrons are and should be the focus of moving forward.  They are teams that benefit each other.  Meeting separately from the other group was never a motivation for composite Squadrons. 

I watched a video about the Army Reserve that was produced around 1954.  It looked like Reservists used to meet on night each week at the unit.  Does anyone know if this was in fact the norm back then?  If so, I can guess that is where the weekly CAP meeting got its start, following military reserve setup.

If you have a bunch of Seniors at a Composite Squadron not doing anything, that is the fault of the Deputy for Seniors and the Squadron Commander. 

For those that meet monthly or bimonthly, how many hours do you meet for??

[Cecil DP]

I watched a video about the Army Reserve that was produced around 1954.  It looked like Reservists used to meet on night each week at the unit.  Does anyone know if this was in fact the norm back then?  If so, I can guess that is where the weekly CAP meeting got its start, following military reserve setup.

A lot of units met 4x a month. Until the 60's when it was determined that one weekend a month got more training accomplished and required less paperwork.

[bosshawk]

I can confirm that some Army Reserve units met once a week in the 50s.  I was in one from Sep 57 until Mar 59, in Brooklyn, NY and we met every Monday night.  Then, I went on AD and never was in a Reserve unit again.  That said, even in those days, the Army Guard had a one weekend per month schedule: guess that the Reserve adopted that schedule.

[Gunner C]

Does anyone know how the Iowa Wing monthly "drill" idea turned out?  Did it help or hurt?

[RiverAux]

It was the norm for National Guard units to meet weekly up until WWII at least.  Don't know when they started going to monthly. 

[flyguy06]

My Composite Squadron is "integrated".  We all work together.  Just because you are not "Cadet Age", does not mean you will not benefit from the Cadet material and vice-versa.  When Cadets have to do SDA's does your respective Senior Member Officer come to a Cadet meeting to meet with the Cadet or does the cadet go to a Senior only meeting? 

Composite Squadrons are and should be the focus of moving forward.  They are teams that benefit each other.  Meeting separately from the other group was never a motivation for composite Squadrons. 

I watched a video about the Army Reserve that was produced around 1954.  It looked like Reservists used to meet on night each week at the unit.  Does anyone know if this was in fact the norm back then?  If so, I can guess that is where the weekly CAP meeting got its start, following military reserve setup.

If you have a bunch of Seniors at a Composite Squadron not doing anything, that is the fault of the Deputy for Seniors and the Squadron Commander. 

For those that meet monthly or bimonthly, how many hours do you meet for??

Are you suggesting haing cadets attend senior member meetings? We did this a long time ago and lost a lot of cadets. They were bored.

[Spike]

^ You can only see it as "senior meetings" or "cadet meetings" because you currently are a segregated unit. 

Safety is a meeting/ presentation/ activity both Cadets and Seniors MUST attend.  ORM, OPSEC etc.  If you are correctly running your Squadron, Cadets should be shadowing Senior counterparts to meet SDA requirements. 

There are times when Seniors will need to meet alone as a group, that is understood. 

Why can you not have your Cadet and Senior meetings in one location on the same night??

[RiverAux]

To answer the original question, I don't know that there are a lot of "exta fun" topics for senior meetings, but in my experience you get good results by having a well-planned training program given by someone with good teaching skills at each meeting.  If people think they are going to learn something by coming, they'll come.  If they think that all they're going to hear are some announcements, a stupid safety briefing, and maybe some paperwork, they're not coming back.