Membership Soars Past 61,000!!!

[RADIOMAN015]

See the article here:
http://www.capvolunteernow.com/todays_features.cfm/cap_membership_soars_past_61000?show=news&newsID=9131

61383 members as of 10/31/2010.   Cadets:  26335 & Seniors: 35048.   No further breakdown was far as aerospace members, retired members, patron members etc.

Of course we all know the reality of "active" and "contributing" members is quite different than the numbers
RM 

[RiverAux]

Hard to have overall numbers going up without also having the number of active members going up at the same time. 

That being said, with all our different membership categories I'd like to see the trends broken down better.  Are the senior members being claimed ACTUAL senior members or do they include adults in the other categories such as Aerospace Education Members?

[jimmydeanno]

Why are you taking such a dismal view of such good news?  Membership growing, year after year, doesn't necessarily mean that our active membership is somehow lower.  If anything, it means that we have more people coming in that want to be active.

Membership growth is a fantastic thing, even if it's 10,000 extra patron members.  There really is no "downside" to this news.

WOO HOO! GO CAP!

[a2capt]

Because in the past when they have shown just how many they have added in one year, pure numbers, and then they tell you the total each year .. it's astounding how many people get added and how many drop.

If we all could figure out a way to retain, those additions would mean a whole LOT more.

[CAP Producer]

Because in the past when they have shown just how many they have added in one year, pure numbers, and then they tell you the total each year .. it's astounding how many people get added and how many drop.

If we all could figure out a way to retain, those additions would mean a whole LOT more.

It's simple. Leaders at all levels need to take care of our people better.

[meganite]

I'm new, and I'm an active member Well I guess numbers can get anyone down, since they don't always say the true situation, but there's hope. Yay CAP!!! I'll do my best and see if I can get some friends to join too

And CAP Producer: I agree with you.

[C/Martin]

I agree with CAP producer also. My squadrons has 23 cadets on the rooster and only 15 of them ecver show up. We actuaklly have 3 cadets who have been on the roosters for 2 years, but do not show up.

[RiverAux]

Nothing new to any of this.  In every organization you have inactive and active members.  In every organization a significant percentage of new members drop out after the first year.  I've never seen anything showing that CAP has any worse problem with this than any other group. 

[Eclipse]

I agree with CAP producer also. My squadrons has 23 cadets on the rooster and only 15 of them ecver show up. We actuaklly have 3 cadets who have been on the roosters for 2 years, but do not show up.

Why are they still on the roster?

[FW]

As of today, we have almost 63,000 members.  This is about where we were after  Sept, 2001; the highest membership so far in the past decade.  No matter how you look at the numbers, this is good news.

[RiverAux]

Wow, almost 2,000 new members in less than 2 weeks!

My interest in getting the internal numbers is so that we can actually do year-to-year comparisons.  Our membership today has several categories that weren't present in the old days that are quite large. 

[RADIOMAN015]

As of today, we have almost 63,000 members.  This is about where we were after  Sept, 2001; the highest membership so far in the past decade.  No matter how you look at the numbers, this is good news.

These type of press releases are great for PR outside of CAP, internally we should be provided the breakdown of the membership into the various categories that are currently authorized.  On a monthly basis that should be posted to the members only website.  I would think with that new expensive association management software package they are getting, they will have the capability to do a lot more analysis without much programming effort.

I can only speak from what I observe in my unit, with between 40 to 50 senior members listed, I would consider about 43% as active & contributing members to the unit.  On the cadet side, our cadet management personnel have told me that of the almost 50 cadets, about 30-35% are regular attendees (meaning 4 out of 5 meetings a month, 3 out of 4 meetings per month). 

RM

 

[bosshawk]

I would hope that those who are cheering about adding so many new members will concentrate on making them productive, active members.  As has been mentioned, a significant number will likely be 1 year members.  I have found over the years(almost 18), that about 30-40% can be counted on to participate in any sort of active way: I am only talking about seniors.  I have no experience with the cadet side of the house, so don't have first hand experience in that arena.

In the Sq that I belong to, we have lost three members in the past month to non-renewals and one has transferred to another Wing.  By the end of the year, we will lose one more to non-renewal and there have been NO new members in over a year.  I have mentioned a recruiting effort and get stared at.  That is out of about 15 active members, so the work force is getting pretty thin.  Who is getting all the new members?  It certainly isn't CAWG: our numbers have dropped in the past month.

[jimmydeanno]

We had 10 potential members at our meeting on Monday, just sayin'.

[coudano]

Because in the past when they have shown just how many they have added in one year, pure numbers, and then they tell you the total each year .. it's astounding how many people get added and how many drop.

If we all could figure out a way to retain, those additions would mean a whole LOT more.

It's simple. Leaders at all levels need to take care of our people better.

There's a little more to it than that...
CAP needs a legitimate "full time" operational mission as well.  That would help the commanders focus the attention of their people.

[RiverAux]

CAP needs a legitimate "full time" operational mission as well. 

We have several. 

[FW]

 ^yes. we do have several and, if you think having a viable cadet program and aerospace education program; combined with a somewhat successfull school program is less than "full time"....

Anyway, after looking (somewhat quickly) over the membership lists, the member numbers include all catagories except retired.  As far as "active members" are concerned, anything over 20% is a good thing in most organizations.   

[RiverAux]

FW- any idea about the 2K membership jump in 2 weeks?  Seems just a little out of whack. 

[FW]

I think the difference can be due to the way CAP "counts" members.  After the 31st, all members not getting their renewals in by the 31st of the month are dropped from the member list.  They are "picked up" again after the 1st of the next month when the "check" is processed.  That usually is the reason for such large increases in the first two weeks of any month.  Membership keeps creeping up until the end of the month.  Then, the cycle repeats.  To show a trend in membership, we need to look at the previous 6 to 12 months for comparisons. 

[JC004]

FW- any idea about the 2K membership jump in 2 weeks?  Seems just a little out of whack.

Maybe they decided to input applications that have been sitting for a while.     No...I was thinking maybe being near the beginning of the school year with enough time for things to be going for a while - classes to start, students to make friends, units doing recruiting in schools.  It seems like a majority of units do like a 3-week visit thing for prospective members.  So going back a month, that puts you after the end of the summer when things have calmed down and school has got going.  I had a policy of a year-round recruiting attitude because I hated the previous excuses of "It's the summer - everyone's busy" and "It's the school year - everyone's busy."  (It's always the school year or not the school year)  That didn't seem to change the fact that a lot of the recruiting seemed to get done at the beginning of the school year - at least for us.