This is where the Sector Commander comes in and rather than having an OC Coffee actually talks to the staff and checks these sort of things, but the likelihood is the WSCs were these OCs 
that said I hold out much hope for my current one, 3rd since I became an OC / went into uniform less than 3 years ago!
1 Like
Hereâs hoping, the amount of stuff I publish which doesnât seem to get to the Staff is very frustrating.
This is why I firmly those in wing roles should be able to push events pass the OC.
I get why they wouldnât want that for cadets
2 Likes
I agree with volunteer portal we should be able to advertise to all staff, I would also like to have that option for staff cadets too.
I get why not for cadets though.
I agree with @Paracetamol in that we need to move away from the âbig ticketâ miles away courses and events. As things are and will remain for some time, is people travelling across the country or even counties going to be encouraged for non-essential things. Us and what we do is not by any stretch essential, except maybe in some minds. In the current climate I canât see anyone being willing to transport non family members for quite a while. This will apply to collective travel of any kind. People at work who were bus users to get to/from work, not anymore, they have been driving since last March.
As for staff not knowing about things, rubbish. Itâs when you put things in front of them, they look into the details and longer term side of things, they go off the boil. You put the information in front of them and let them decide. Remember these are adults who make decisions about what to do and not to do, every day. Itâs not down to the âAir Cadetsâ to bully, badger or guilt trip them into it, we do that too much with cadets.
Want people to take up things, make it attractive.
Again though this is all being discussed as itâs our problem to solve, it is not, in any way. However if it is, what is the point of our SLT? They should be looking at the problems and coming up with and implementing the solutions. If they canât, get rid.
We have been in an altered reality since March and this needs to be embraced and change, rather than just try and go back to the same old, same old. But we have too many people with vested interests to consider anything new.
3 Likes
I merged the two topics with almost identical names, because I think that was what was envisaged.
Carry on.
3 Likes
Not gonna lie⊠Got super confused for a moment there
Sorry! I tried but forgot to search for other topics before merging them.
2 Likes
What are you terming a âmoduleâ here?
A single weekend so;
- LLA Training
- LLA Assessment
- Expedition Skills Module
OK, that makes sense then. I wish everyone would do some simple maths like you have here and work out what they are actually asking for. 
So you are correct, under your assumptions we can deliver 156 qualified Lowland Leaders every year across the Corps; that assumes that at least 4 of those who attend training go on to successfully complete an assessment. I think in reality there are probably less courses than that, as it makes more sense for people to work together and have a bigger course because of other constraints such as accommodation (e.g. you might have two CDs per region - but you might only run one âsetâ per year - trg, assessment & exped - one person is the director for the course and the second is additional staff, allowing you to have larger numbers on the course). Not saying it isnât possible to have a CDs running their own courses, because it is - Iâm just not sure how frequently that occurs vs. âdouble staffingâ.
The last exped module we ran only had 4 people on it. The maximum weâve had on a training was about 8 I think, with a capacity of 12. Weâve run two trainnig courses and an assessment in one year, followed by a training, assessment and exped module IIRC. The year with two training courses we found difficult to get a viable course.
What people may not know is that we have to carefully manage the course director numbers in the organisation; we have to be able to justify them by having the demand. Too many course directors and we end up putting on loads of courses (which dilute the numbers applying for courses run by other course directors). These courses then never reach critical mass and end up being cancelled due to dropouts. This gives us a reputational issue as we may seem to be a âpoor qualityâ provider in Mountain Trainingâs eyes, which is not good for our overall relationship with the NGB.
For those that donât know, HQAC hold the âprovidershipâ - i.e. they are the âbusinessâ under which all courses are run. Course directors are then appointed to a provider - so itâs not like they can go off and start running their own commercial courses, as all courses have to be done under the HQAC banner.
Maybe one of the things that has to change is open the courses to other youth orgs and or do them in conjunction with youth orgs, to get the numbers up. Surely the course content etc is the same, unless there is something amazing about the Air Cadets way of doing things?
In this way you potentially open up more opportunities and reduce the load.
But I suspect there would be little will to do this as it might bust some egos in Air Cadet land if people opted to go elsewhere to get the same thing.
Again there is making the idea attractive to people. Perhaps having a non-Air Cadet member of staff running it would make it more appealing as there is a reduced potential for baggage and preconceptions about people.
4 Likes
Was your new years resolution to speak sense?
Youâve been on fire the last 2 days.
I know for a fact the SCC are well up for joining in our activities in my neck of the woods so you may be correct
5 Likes
It would help enormously if we could publish Wg courses directly to all cadets. Currently between half and 2/3 of Sqns advertise ours on Cadet Portal on a good day. I really donât mind sifting through applications. It doesnât take that long.
Likewise it would be great if an update to the âmasterâ SMS app pulls through to the Cadet Portal as Sqns donât always (rarely?) update it. One for @james_elliott?
Topic drift - I know - the above wonât deal with staff quals but maybe the new staff portal will.
they are letting the real Teflon back out next week when the Xmas decorations come down
We have already done this with another Cadet org, ok on a small scale and for staff but it worked well. And people at our end were v supportive as it filled a delivery gap at the time.
I for one welcome the new Teflon.
5 Likes
Course content is exactly the same. Itâs not set by us.
Having other CFs along is easy. Having other organisations along gets challenging because of insurance - Iâm sure itâs not an unsolvable problem but youâd probably end up having to purchase PLI/PI insurance for the course directors & staff.
Not at all. Iâd far rather people did the course - I donât care where they do it - as long as they end up with the qual and getting cadets out. Thatâs the rub really - we can provide the courses internally, but they will be subject to all of the limitations of volunteers & organisational faff. But theyâll be uber cheap / free. Commercial courses - more are available, but you gotta cough up for them.
Another option, especially for courses that arenât frequently available, is claiming VA for the days of the course. That can be approved by HQAC and then you can go to any NGB provider, which allows much more flexibility of dates for the individual volunteer.
1 Like
Arguably you are still at a loss as if you did the course within cadets it would be much cheaper and you can still claim the same VA. But it is a valid point still.