Need advise on cadet ES training

[Walkman]

I'm having trouble with my long-term planning calendar. This will be a little rambling, so bear with me...

Background: Our composite squadron does ES training with cadets for about 45 minutes on the 2nd week of the month. We've got a handful of cadets with either UDF or GTM3, but most of them have only GES at the moment. We also have spotty attendance each week. We don't get very high attendance at Wing training events, either.

I'm trying to plan out the next several months worth of training sessions. Since there's such a long gap between each session and there's going to be a decent amount of inconsistency in month-to-month attendance, it seems that just starting the F&Ps on one of the SQTRs and working our way through would be very ineffective. On the other hand, I'm hesitant to just grab random tasks off the SQTR for each session.

I know one of the most effective ways for cadets to work on ES quals is weekend FTXs and the like. This summer there's a lot of Wing events, so I don't think I want to schedule a weekend FTX right now, so I'll still need some quality sessions for the next few months, then other activities to work on after we do an FTX sometime this fall.

It's a bit different for the SMs. We do ES training every week. We start a specialty and go week by week until we have a graduation. It's pretty easy for us, since this is the main focus of meeting nights.

The solution is probably simple, I've jut been brain blocked on it for a while.

[Spaceman3750]

See, I go the opposite direction with this. I gave up on the concept of "ES Night" (though it has been requested that I bring it back by our GTM3 C/CC... I delegated it back to him ). Every couple of months we'll do an ES briefing about a recent SAREX or something we participated in and give a background of how CAP ES works etc. Then I put the onus on the cadets (and seniors) - come see me if you want to get involved and I will tell you where to get the knowledge you need to get qualified.

[Garibaldi]

I'm having trouble with my long-term planning calendar. This will be a little rambling, so bear with me...

Background: Our composite squadron does ES training with cadets for about 45 minutes on the 2nd week of the month. We've got a handful of cadets with either UDF or GTM3, but most of them have only GES at the moment. We also have spotty attendance each week. We don't get very high attendance at Wing training events, either.

I'm trying to plan out the next several months worth of training sessions. Since there's such a long gap between each session and there's going to be a decent amount of inconsistency in month-to-month attendance, it seems that just starting the F&Ps on one of the SQTRs and working our way through would be very ineffective. On the other hand, I'm hesitant to just grab random tasks off the SQTR for each session.

I know one of the most effective ways for cadets to work on ES quals is weekend FTXs and the like. This summer there's a lot of Wing events, so I don't think I want to schedule a weekend FTX right now, so I'll still need some quality sessions for the next few months, then other activities to work on after we do an FTX sometime this fall.

It's a bit different for the SMs. We do ES training every week. We start a specialty and go week by week until we have a graduation. It's pretty easy for us, since this is the main focus of meeting nights.

The solution is probably simple, I've jut been brain blocked on it for a while.

Not really. I've had the same issue with scheduling training. It's not so hard if you have a DCC who is pro-ES, and more difficult if the DCC is anti-ES, like the last one I had.

It sounds like meeting attendance issue is the real problem. If you give them something fun to do that accomplishes your mission, word will get out that meetings are the place to be on the 2nd week.

I guess the best thing for you to do would be to get together with your senior cadets and DCC and see what sort of interest there is. Get the leadership interested and the cadet corps will follow. Cadets, for the most part, love hands-on. Make your training calendar interesting. Most of what you have to teach them can be done in the woods, which the cadets love. I always have a great turnout whenever we do an overnighter. Even the female cadets, believe it or not.

Hope this helps.

[coudano]

We do our GTM/UDF training in a one weekend once or twice a year class.
With a little schedule discipline, you can cover all 33 tasks for GTM3 except for probably first aid/cpr, with a little practice exercise that combines all of the skills together, in a single weekend.

That gets people more than ready to go out the door to a sarex.

We don't do ours as a FTX (outdoors) per se, but it can certainly be done that way (and we have, in the past).


Anyway, you're probably looking at 18-20 hours of training all together (not counting things like eating and sleeping)
That would be 9-10 consecutive squadron meetings of nothing but ES...  So as you have noted, not really plausible on the weekly meeting front.

[Eclipse]

You need more than 45 minutes a month to get cadets serious.  You're already doing senior training, include them in that schedule,
and adjust it to include topics everyone is interested in.

At a minimum the 5th Tuesdays should be for ES, and at least one activity outside a quarter.

[Huey Driver]

In my tiny squadron who does ~45 min of ES per month, it took me an additional 2.5 years of training outside the squadron to get GTM3. I also have been on multiple UDF missions, but I'm having a helluva time trying to even get UDF qualified.

Being the only active person in my squadron (cadets and seniors) with any ground-based SAR training has made it very difficult for me to progress anywhere.

From  a cadet's perspective, I'd say one ES night per month by itself is not enough. Most squadrons building ES should have at least Bi-Annual FTX's. Groups (where applicable), should also have SAREX's regularly and GSAR schools, along with their wing.

[Walkman]

I'm lucky in that MIWG is very active in ES and there's a a good amount of training for those motivated to tie into. MIWG SAR Academy is coming up in a few weeks, which is a good 10 days of training.

I'm relieved to see I'm not the only one with this issue.

I decided we're going to work on building tarp shelters this week. It ties into GTM3 reqs and will be hands-on. We had a schedule snafu last week, so they did some UDF'ing. I think I'll focus less on SQTR tasks for the ES week and work harder to push people to the other training events outside meeting nights to get tasks signed off.

[EMT-83]

It seems that with such an active SM ES group, getting cadets trained shouldn't be all that hard. Why not train together?

[Walkman]

It seems that with such an active SM ES group, getting cadets trained shouldn't be all that hard. Why not train together?

Good point & we'll be working towards that. Our SM ES program is really new and right now we're doing aircrew. GT/UDF quals will be later this year, early next year.

We've been in transition as unit this year. We went from a Cadet sqdn to Composite and introduced the beginnings of a robust ES program at the same time.

[ol'fido]

You say that you want to avoid doing a weekend FTX because your wing has a lot scheduled on weekends this year?

I have found that if you try to avoid conflicting with every wing/group activity, you will end up never having an activity and you will end up taking the 2.5 years(WOW!) that it took jersey Cadet to make GT3.

[Walkman]

You say that you want to avoid doing a weekend FTX because your wing has a lot scheduled on weekends this year?

I have found that if you try to avoid conflicting with every wing/group activity, you will end up never having an activity and you will end up taking the 2.5 years(WOW!) that it took jersey Cadet to make GT3.

Good point.

[Eclipse]

I have found that if you try to avoid conflicting with every wing/group activity, you will end up never having an activity and you will end up taking the 2.5 years(WOW!) that it took jersey Cadet to make GT3.

+1

Do your own thing and intersect with other echelons, etc., when you're able.