I've recently been named my squadron's ES Training Officer, and it's my first CAP staff position of any kind.
So, those of you who've been around for a while and done this before, what can you share with me? What works, what doesn't? Any tricks of the trade to clue me in on? Who has the ES magic wand?
One of my immediate tasks is to take a full stock of where we are, training- and equipment-wise, and submit recommendations for improvements. It's going to take a while, but obviously I want to do this right.
Thanks in advance for any input.
Make sure you are appointed in eServices, see whoever has WSA, to do it. Thats by default, the CC, and the IT officer gets it by default, too. (unless you're in one of those commands that has elected to retain it at higher HQ)
When you are appointed, your assessment of training and rating standings is really simple since it all needs to be done online ..
Read your CAPR 20-1 job description and the job description for the ES officer. Become VERY familiar with CAPP 213, CAPR 50-15, CAPR 55-1, CAPR 60-1, CAPR 60-3, CAPP 2 and applicable FEMA publications. Make the unit ES officer do his job. Become very familiar and comfortable with Ops Quals in eServices.
Quote from: WheelsUp on May 14, 2010, 01:20:03 AM
One of my immediate tasks is to take a full stock of where we are, training- and equipment-wise, and submit recommendations for improvements.
I was appointed as the ES training officer in my former squadron some years ago to get the ES program going and the first thing I realized is that very few members had their GES completed. So I made that my number one priority. I made up a powerpoint on topics they should know and that assisted those members without the GES to complete their various tests. I later got them going on the CAPT117 tests. I then sought out members throughout our wing (we have no groups) to help out with specific tasks for achievements for MRO and MSA. These are basically entry-level achievements that almost anyone should be able to complete. Those who were interested in flying were given opportunities to complete various tasks as relates to both MO and MS. Become very familiar with CAPR 60-3; that's your bible. Hopefully your group or wing conducts a sufficient number of exercises in which members can participate .
How I started / restarted my squadron's ES component is first looking at the member reports.
I answered these questions:
Do I have a Urban Team? If not what do I need to get that?
Do I have a Ground Team? If not what do I need to get that?
Is everyone PROPERLY qualified?
Is safety up to snuff?
Does everyone have ICS 100-200-700-800?
Does everyone have ORM, Basic and Intermediate?
CPR/First aid?
I usually do a bulk of my classroom training in the winter months, followed by field ops in the spring.
A few years ago our wing actually held GT School where over a weekend in February and one in March, we qualified about 50 members of the wing in Ground Ops. Feb school was 90% classroom 10% outdoors, March was the opposite.
There's about a billion issues there...I did a lot of this. I could probably help you out.
There is an ES officers correspondence course, its a little dated but should help you get your feet on the ground.
First thing you need to consider is what sort of ES capability your squadron actually wants to have. For example, some cadet squadrons are focused on other things and don't do much, if any ES.
Then take a look at the number of members you have that are potentially capable of participating in various aspects of ES and the equipment you have locally or that you might be able to get from Wing. No airplane? Then probably a focus on ground team and base staff tasks would be better. Airplane, but no van? Then probably focus on aircrew to start.
The other advice given is good too...
One of the biggest challenges I faced was keeping up with 80+ eager ES cadets (and a couple of seniors too!). So I tried to put a lot of info in one place for them - allowed me to develop a training plan instead of spending nights answering emails
If you are in a cadet squadron get your advanced ES cadets involved in the training planning and execution!
One of our cadets wrote a great "Ops Quals" guide - finally published it 3 weeks before they roled out the new version!
http://sites.google.com/site/tvcscalendar/Home/emergency-services
Good luck!
Nice resource. :clap:
@321EOD: Great page on Google, I may establish something similar. Kudos.
I'm in the midst of the 02130D (ES) course, and am getting Squadron and Wing resources together to create an actual training program for our gang.
Thanks to all of you for some excellent ideas. I've got my work cut out for me.
When I had some questions about how outdated 2013 was (refers to manuals that no longer exist) I was told to not bother with it because a "new" on line course was due out the middle of this month (May)
Richard Sipp
SM
Rsipp: Good to know. Will keep an eye out for that and take the updated course if I can. Thanks.
And yeah, the current 2130D course is circa 1985 or so, I think.
WAY out of date.
Quote from: WheelsUp on May 24, 2010, 02:53:37 AM
And yeah, the current 2130D course is circa 1985 or so, I think.
WAY out of date.
What'd you call me?
I can probably put together a pretty big set of resources for you, if you'd like. We should probably talk about what you need. I did it last year for some people. It was a hit, even though a bunch of the stuff needs updating. It's a start/framework.
JC004: Haha, I'm calling myself "out of date" as well.
At any rate, please don't expend too much energy - I think I've got a good handle on what I need to do, but a few more tips/tricks/pointers are always welcome. Thanks much!
Have some hip pocket training materials. Pick a few tasks from various SQTRs that can be taught in 30-60 minutes and keep them handy for those times when the planned training falls through. Much better than the default - drill. Have a variety so you're not doing the same task over and over again.
Quote from: WheelsUp on May 24, 2010, 01:38:34 PM
JC004: Haha, I'm calling myself "out of date" as well.
At any rate, please don't expend too much energy - I think I've got a good handle on what I need to do, but a few more tips/tricks/pointers are always welcome. Thanks much!
Well I didn't spend years developing stuff so it'd sit on my hard drive. I did spend a lot of hours putting together the last resource set for people, but it was alright because lots of people got lots of use out of it. After they downloaded the stuff, I had to delete the directory because it took up so much space. I'll see if maybe I could just find a handful of good stuff that isn't too out of date.
I was really into developing ES stuff and spent a lot of time on it. I was one of the first cadet TTTs in PAWG, then one of the first two cadet CTTTs. LOTS of time invested in that. THEN, they implemented SET. Nice. Real nice.
Quote from: Short Field on May 14, 2010, 03:29:12 AM
Read your CAPR 20-1 job description and the job description for the ES officer. Become VERY familiar with CAPP 213, CAPR 50-15, CAPR 55-1, CAPR 60-1, CAPR 60-3, CAPP 2 and applicable FEMA publications. Make the unit ES officer do his job. Become very familiar and comfortable with Ops Quals in eServices.
Good luck finding a copy of CAPR 50-15 and CAPR 55-1. They were replaced by CAPR 60-3 quite a few years ago. If you can find them, though get a copy and keep them as they do ahve stuff in them that can be very valuable and hard to find.
Yea, my bad. I was just repeating what the CURRENT CAPR 20-1 says. Silly me.