of the four senior schools in our catchment, none will give permission for absence for cadet activities - and few of the parents are interested in asking, and certainly not for an airshow.
try a bit harder, and you might get to estate agent level. have you thought about FTRS in Lincolnshire?
My squadron have attended RIAT for many years now, the cadets love it and itās a struggle to select people for limited places rather than to find people willing to fill them. Having said that I hated my first experience at RIAT but gave it another go this year after a five year absence and loved it. On the whole RIAT seems quite popular in my Wing.
Know of any good jobs going 
Anyways, try harder. Speak to your local education lead and āeducateā them. Imagine if the RAF gave up in 1940.
Iāve never had any cadets show the slightest interest in RIAT, so this yearās response isnāt unexpected.
A couple older cadets (left school) have gone with parents and havenāt been swayed to do it with the ATC, watching and speaking to the cadets working there never inspired them, to ask about it.
As for Scottish cadets, school summer holidays in Scotland start and finish earlier than England IIRC,
It does seem like a cheap shot by HQAC to continually piggy-back this and make it into a national event, when you think there must be more than enough squadrons within 20-30 miles or so of Fairford to āstaffā it and make it a big local event. I suppose those who have retired with many rings at HQAC like it for other reasons.
As for getting term time off, it depends on the school and if you make too much noise about it, you could do more harm than good. Iāve learnt to suck it in and not get too worried about it.
Going back to Angusā comment. I remember the links with RIAT which allowed schools/CFs to go in on Friday, great idea and had a greater uptake then we do now. Went along several times on these trips, brilliant.
As for going RIAT now, no way too bl00dy expensive. Yes, thereās the camp for those who want to attend that route but for those who just want to attend for one day, there are no benefits. Any child under 16 gets in free, not just cadets; for those cadets aged 16 and over or staff, where is the incentive to go or take cadets?? Ā£40 each to get in; I think not.
There should be a dispensation for those in uniform or in possession of a MOD ID, or something identifying them as ACO members for CIs.
Yeah they finish end of June start back mid Augustā¦
that is because what RAFCTE ask us to task is ever growing and not something a camp of 300 can achieve
see above.
i have been going for 15 years and seen the camp grow from a casually run B&G Wing event into the (in)national event it is today.
it got too big for the then WExO to manage and was picked up by HQAC and thus only appropriate to include it as a nation camp
it is a campā¦not an airshow. visiting an airshow i am with you. it is recognised as a "annual camp and should be treated as such.
for as long as i can remember (from the days of a few 100s to the allocation of 1000 beds in 2016) there have been more bids than places, often/typically 2 bids for every bed space. that has to say something when units struggle to fill annual camp placesā¦
It is an airshow, the fact we use it as a national camp is secondary. Itās a but like me calling a weekend public event we do a camp.
RB all airshows are bloody expensive and in the modern era there are increasingly less aircraft to justify the increasing cost. There are a number of free ones, normally at a seaside resort. There would need to be something truly spectacular and unique to make we want to pay to go into an airshow. Even in days of old, once youād seen one static run of the mill service aircraft youāve seen them all and likewise in flight.
my Headmasters - all academy schools - have no interest whatsoever. they do recognise some extra-curricular activity, and two of them could be regarded as at least ānot hostileā, but none of them would sign off absence for a UK camp.
an overseas camp quite possibly, a skill course (climbing, flying etcā¦) also quite possibly, but for a UK camp - thats an airshow - not only are they not interested in giving permission, my parents arenāt interested in asking for it.
personally, having two children at school, and knowing how difficult it can be getting time off genuinely important stuff, i donāt blame my parents one bit for saving up their requests for things they regard as far more important.
What, there are more important things in familiy life (and school life) than ATC activities ā¦ whoād have thought it.
When you look at Fairfordās location and event length when you have kids that need to be at school on Monday, it seems somewhat impractical to bill it as a national cadet event.
Wrt riat what percentage of cadets live more than 80 drving miles from Fairford. If itās less than 75% itās hardly a national camp, itās a local event that some out of area types manage to get to. If you add in that most Wings will pick up / drop cadets off somewhere out of the way, for parents to drive to and from twice. in our Wing the most popular point this is an hour return drive for many.
We are around 3 hours drive from Fairford and already our wing has 67% of its strength who have bid to attend. They must be doing something the kids likeā¦
oh i understand completely where people are on the subject of taking kids out of school and how some Head Teachers are ānoā people. we have one ourselves.
but I am lost at which point you are referring to in your replyā¦??
What is the 3 hours in terms of road miles (not straight line), does it include sitting around in the traffic getting out and all the other factors that a 3 hour autoroute calculation misses. Does the 3 hours include a stop after two or so hours? Is the 3 hours to a drop off point or to the cadetsā door?
My old favourite of Mildenhall according to the AA is about 1Ā½ hours, but getting home from start to finish for the airshow would be an hour longer, due to traffic getting out and of all the airshows Iāve ever been to, the Yanks ran a really slick operation (in comparison to many Iāve been to) in terms of getting out.
Three hours RVP to RAF Fairford. Donāt forget as a camp, you donāt have traffic issues as you donāt travel on the main days. That includes a 30min wee stop.
@glass_half_empty_2 sorry for the delayed response but I contacted those in the know, due to Christmas they have only just had chance to get back to me but the figures are as below for attending regions
Region Name - %attending RIAT (% of the Corps total figures (2014 numbers))
Central & East - 11% (18%)
LASER ā 11% (19%)
North ā 6% (15%)
Other (CCF etc) - 8% (15%)
Scotland & N Ireland ā 14% (7%)
South West ā 28% (16%)
Wales & West ā 22% (10%)
So yes there is a distinct bias towards the closest two regions, 50% of the attendees came from the two local Regions. Not all of these would be within the 80mile radius however, I know of several Squadron travelling from the Plymouth area, and others from the south end of H&IOW both within SW Region but over 100miles out.
Even the regular attending āold guardā from Wales have 100miles to travel from Cardiff or the Valleys based Squadrons. So although it looks like 50% of the attendees are local, even they have more than the 80mile radius you class as ālocalā (the ACO Contingent Commander 2015 and previously Campsite Manager travels from Abergavenny, one of the closest Welsh attending Squadrons, still has a 72 mile trip)
Interestingly Scotland has 7% of the total Corps Cadet population but had 14% attendance at RIAT and so was well represented at Fairford despite being the furthest out to travel. (for those who care that is almost 1 in every 6 was from S&NI regionā¦.)
This tells an interesting story. Although not an equal distribution it does show that there is significant coverage of RIAT nationally in the Corps. Not just every region attended but every Wing had representation too which is not insignificant in itself.
I cannot speak for other National camps such as the Drill& Ceremonial, Junior Leaders and Aerospace but given RIAT requires the Staff as well as the Cadets (at a 1:5 ratio) this is even more impressive as it is not just a case of sending a Cadet on their way but requires equal dedication and commitment from a Staff member, which in the S&NI case requires extras days leave just to allow for the travel time down the country or to allow for the crossing of the Irish Sea.
24 seats in Chinooks, cdts not allowed to use floor belts
Back from Beds & Cambs Wg 75th Anniversary Parade - target was 750 cadets & I donāt think that they were far off.
The claim is that is was the largest ever parade of cadets in the ACO history. Anyone know different? 
New Wg banner too. A very good day overall, a lot of hard work obviously went into this. 
Nothing today in my Wing, hurrah!
Also 750 cadets is very impressive, my Wingās overall strength is less than that.
we did nothing as a Sqn, weāve got a week booked at a bunkhouse at the start of the summer holidays as our 75th anniversary celebration - lots AT and BBQā¦
however, to honour āventure adventureā, over the weekend some of the older cadets - not as cadets - did a two day walking and bivvying trip in north wales. a bit wet and windy for my tastes, but i suppose thats the idea.
750?! I think a few from around here were only asked to send 5/10. The 150 anniversary parade sent a coach of 40 plus staff.
