How were you recruited?

[Private Investigator]

My brother and he got it at flight school from a guest speaker from CAP.   

[Brad]

I joined as a senior member back in 2007, but I found out about CAP before that, back in high school. My school had a "wacky day" for our Spirit Week, and our NJROTC SNSI wore his CAP uniform instead of his Navy uniform. Certainly threw us all for a loop!

[ColonelJack]

I'd never heard of CAP until a fellow I knew in the local police department found out I'd been in the Air Force and contacted me about CAP.  I was hooked from the first meeting I attended, and the rest - as they say - is history.

Jack

[Dad2-4]

No option fits. I was a cadet back in 77-78 for a short time. Later served 4 years USAF 1985-89. Later moved back to the area of my last duty station. One day was surfing online for things like USAF Sgt's Association, Foreign Legion, etc, and remembered CAP. Looked it up, found a unit one mile away, made a phone call, visited with my 2 sons, joined very soon afterward. That was over 10 years ago. My boys are too old to be cadets and lost interest, but I'm still in.

[Cliff_Chambliss]

In the early 1960's it seemed CAP Cadets were everywhere.  Working parking and crowd control at the annual airport open house.  Volunteer crowd control at the annual Cerebal Palsy Telethon (all 3 squadrons in the city would join together for the weekend).  Marching in the Veteran's Day Parade (three cadet squadrons marching as a single group made an impression),  The annual state fair would allow free admission to CAP Cadets in uniform,  Several times CAP was asked to provide honor guard at civic events.  CAP was energetic and the city embraced the CAP.  There were even CAP Public Service Ads on the TV and Radio.  This I left for active Military Duty.  24 years later, return to the old squadron and find a flying club.  Leave for another 15 years.  Been in 3 years this time and it seems CA-WHO? 
  Somewhere along the line CAP has become the butt of many a joke.  A city that once hosted three composite squadrons now has 1 composite and 1 senior squadron.  The average age of membership is - to put it kindly - ancient.
  History is nice, but I would really like to see and get some good ideas to implement and maintain a good recruiting and member retention program now.
 

[johnnyb47]

My number came up in the draft.

[usafcap1]

I was at an airshow in Dayton, OH in 2007. Long story short a plane crashed and CAP was one of the first to response. And I wanted to be part of that.

[Private Investigator]

In the early 1960's it seemed CAP Cadets were everywhere.  Working parking and crowd control at the annual airport open house.  Volunteer crowd control at the annual Cerebal Palsy Telethon (all 3 squadrons in the city would join together for the weekend).  Marching in the Veteran's Day Parade (three cadet squadrons marching as a single group made an impression),  The annual state fair would allow free admission to CAP Cadets in uniform,  Several times CAP was asked to provide honor guard at civic events.  CAP was energetic and the city embraced the CAP.  There were even CAP Public Service Ads on the TV and Radio.  This I left for active Military Duty.  24 years later, return to the old squadron and find a flying club.  Leave for another 15 years.  Been in 3 years this time and it seems CA-WHO? 
  Somewhere along the line CAP has become the butt of many a joke.  A city that once hosted three composite squadrons now has 1 composite and 1 senior squadron.  The average age of membership is - to put it kindly - ancient.
  History is nice, but I would really like to see and get some good ideas to implement and maintain a good recruiting and member retention program now.

Cliff, thanks for sharing. I see the same thing. Flying clubs and/or good ole boy lodge thing going on.

[jimmydeanno]

CAP cadets, in general, are different.  I find that it isn't that they don't like the organization, it's that societal expectations dictate that they do 30 different things while they're in high-school so that they're "well rounded."  This means that we are in direct competition with JROTC, BSA, High-School Sports and other extra-curricular activities, and the volunteer stuff that people can just show up to to help.


WIWAC, CAP is what we did.  It was one of two extra things I did outside of school.  I didn't have to miss 3 months of CAP because of football practice, or have to put it as #19 on the list.  All the cadets in my unit, CAP is what we did.  Every cadet was there, every meeting.  The "odd holidays" like Columbus Day, we had meetings and people showed up.  Every cadet went to encampment.  Every cadet knew the requirements for promotion and knew what every other cadet in the unit had left for their next one.  We ran hard, with every cadet in the unit running under 8:30 miles (had some females), and the majority of the cadets running under 7:00.  I remember doing 80+ sit-ups in a minute, alongside other cadets of the same caliber - only going for my Rickenbacker.  None of us did the bare minimum to pass.  We knew what was in our books, too.  Practice for cadet competition enabled us to know answers before the first five words of the sentence were spit out. We were doing some sort of CAP thing EVERY weekend.

I'm not trying to say that CAP was more hard-kewl then, or make it a "back in the day, things were so much better," but my experience over the last 10 years as a senior has shown me that in such a short time what it means to be a CAP Cadet has changed. 

This change in paradigm means that we, as an organization, need to be better, faster, stronger, and offer things that can't be refused in order to get people in the door.  It means that we need to readjust our view of who we think is interested in our organization.  It means that our local senior leadership needs to have a strong finger on the pulse of a community and offer things that the community needs, and do them well.  It means that we need to put in an effort. 

[Walkman]

This change in paradigm means that we, as an organization, need to be better, faster, stronger, and offer things that can't be refused in order to get people in the door.  It means that we need to readjust our view of who we think is interested in our organization.  It means that our local senior leadership needs to have a strong finger on the pulse of a community and offer things that the community needs, and do them well.  It means that we need to put in an effort.

:clap: Well said!

[Майор Хаткевич]

Jimmy summarized what CAP was for me. It was my only activity and I don't think I missed a single meeting until I graduated school and started working.

[Garibaldi]

WIWAC, yes, every meeting, every unit activity, every wing activity that our unit went to, I was there. I took "participate actively in unit activities" to heart. I had nothing else going for me in school but CAP. Too small for football, not quite good enough for the baseball team, too short for basketball (which I hate anyway). Not quite smart enough for debate, etc. You get the picture. The point is, despite the fact that my father told me "you can't treat this like you did Boy Scouts. I am paying for this, so you better give it 100%", I was way excited for Thursday night meetings to roll around, and even more excited whenever we had an FTX or Wing activity. CAP was probably the greatest growing up experience I could hope for. Sure, there were things that I wouldn't want to repeat EVER again, and with one or two notable exceptions, I had the time of my life. I've done things I never thought I would, or could. I'm not entirely certain what I would have been like had it not been for CAP. It got me through some tough times, and sure, what we did was tough on me mentally and physically, but when I look back, I really have to wonder how I would have turned out if I'd said "No, thanks, Dad" in December 1980.