Ranger teams

[DakRadz]

P.S. I love Firefox- it saved this text even though I accidentally the page.

I see what you did there. 

Designed with you in mind- really!

[HGjunkie]

Designed with you in mind- really!

I feel special.... 

[ol'fido]

I was once in a squadron that we had that kind of reputation; neighboring wings would call for assistance from our wing and ask for us specifically over other units.  Why? Because we proved that we could do the job, do it better than the next guy and do it consistantly.  It had nothing with being elite, wearing berets, being Rangers or whatever..... we knew our job, were good at it and were respected for it.

mk

So, what incentive did other units have to improve to your level since they knew they would never be called upon as long as you were around?

I guess I am confused here... It sounds like you are saying there is something wrong with being the best at what you do???

[arajca]

I was once in a squadron that we had that kind of reputation; neighboring wings would call for assistance from our wing and ask for us specifically over other units.  Why? Because we proved that we could do the job, do it better than the next guy and do it consistantly.  It had nothing with being elite, wearing berets, being Rangers or whatever..... we knew our job, were good at it and were respected for it.

mk

So, what incentive did other units have to improve to your level since they knew they would never be called upon as long as you were around?

I guess I am confused here... It sounds like you are saying there is something wrong with being the best at what you do???

No. I'm saying they were being selfish since nothing indicated they were willing share their knowledge/expertise. It comes down to the disincentive that other units may have had since they knew they would be passed over to call out this one special, uber-experienced team. Even when that team was from another wing.

[manfredvonrichthofen]

You know what? You and your team should strive to be that team that gets called to other wings because you are that good at what you do. You should want to be the team that gets asked to train other teams because you are such a good team. That is how you improve your team, by striving to be better than the other teams. You should strive to be that team so that you know that the standard is set high for CAP ES teams everywhere. No, don't be a snob or a donkey about it, be the team who sets the example and the standard and teach the standard. Don't hate others for being that team that are so good that they get called by another wing, be the team that takes that teams spot, then train the team that you beat and train the other teams around you too.

[arajca]

You should want to be the team that gets asked to train other teams because you are such a good team. ... then train the team that you beat and train the other teams around you too.

That is the part that is missing from sarmed1's post. Without it, it demonstrates an elitist attitude that dampens the potential for other units/teams to develop fully.

[commando1]

 My turn to toot my own horn  . I was asked to travel to another squadron to train their ES qualified cadets. They were within my group and knew my team by how hard we trained. None of my cadets have ever attended any NCSA but we have always strived to be the best. We don't wear the Ranger tab...we don't wear orange shirts. We simply train harder and more often than anyone around us.  Our problem is that we have certain cadets who want to be "Rangers" all of a sudden. They want to be called by that name because it implies a higher level of training or just general toughness. Some of the cadets began training for GT2 and that's when the whole ranger mess began. 

[EMT-83]

So they begin training in the second of four levels for ground teams and they're suddenly big, bad rangers?

They couldn't wait until completing, say, half the program?

[HGjunkie]

So they begin training in the second of four levels for ground teams and they're suddenly big, bad rangers?

They couldn't wait until completing, say, half the program?

I smell a debate concerning PII cadets coming....

[ol'fido]

I was once in a squadron that we had that kind of reputation; neighboring wings would call for assistance from our wing and ask for us specifically over other units.  Why? Because we proved that we could do the job, do it better than the next guy and do it consistantly.  It had nothing with being elite, wearing berets, being Rangers or whatever..... we knew our job, were good at it and were respected for it.

mk

So, what incentive did other units have to improve to your level since they knew they would never be called upon as long as you were around?

I guess I am confused here... It sounds like you are saying there is something wrong with being the best at what you do???

No. I'm saying they were being selfish since nothing indicated they were willing share their knowledge/expertise. It comes down to the disincentive that other units may have had since they knew they would be passed over to call out this one special, uber-experienced team. Even when that team was from another wing.

OTOH, nothing indicated that they weren't willing to share either.

[arajca]

I was once in a squadron that we had that kind of reputation; neighboring wings would call for assistance from our wing and ask for us specifically over other units.  Why? Because we proved that we could do the job, do it better than the next guy and do it consistantly.  It had nothing with being elite, wearing berets, being Rangers or whatever..... we knew our job, were good at it and were respected for it.

mk

So, what incentive did other units have to improve to your level since they knew they would never be called upon as long as you were around?

I guess I am confused here... It sounds like you are saying there is something wrong with being the best at what you do???

No. I'm saying they were being selfish since nothing indicated they were willing share their knowledge/expertise. It comes down to the disincentive that other units may have had since they knew they would be passed over to call out this one special, uber-experienced team. Even when that team was from another wing.

OTOH, nothing indicated that they weren't willing to share either.

True, but given the discussion and the attitude many of us have seen from so-called special, ranger, or 'elite' units (you're not one of us, so we don't want to have anything to do with you), most posters would have mentioned that to at least blunt some critism.

[sarmed1]

thanks for putting words in my mouth....... and for the record it doesnt matter what one posts, nothing blunts the critism of some people here, especial on certain key word topics....so why try......you usually just get accused of being part of the cover-ups that run rampant in Civil Air Patrol amongs certain groups.....

but if you must know I didnt get into the relationship details because it wastn relevant to my post at the time.  The only point I was trying to make is that it's not nescesary to say you are an elite or special unit; that is proven by your actions, people see your skills and abilities and use you for them, not because you have a flashy hat or title. 
It might suprise you to know that even though it was a PAWG squadron, we wore no Ranger bling, used no Ranger ratings (it was part of our qualification training plan, but thats because this was in the days of no specific criteria set forth by NHQ for GTM training and qulification)  And as equally suprising we DID train and train with other units, every training weekend was open to all squadrons in our group as well as the neighboring groups, we held a winter and fall specific training weekend with other groups and organized and participated in a ground team competition (not the one run by HMRS either)  Other ES specific training and operations included working with the county EMA for disaster excercise, the airport authority (we were the county SAR resource) as well as other civilian SAR teams (one even had our squadron do their initial training when they were getting up and running)

mk