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 āsetā 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 isnāt possible to have a CDs running their own courses, because it is - Iām just not sure how frequently that occurs vs. ādouble staffingā.
The last exped module we ran only had 4 people on it. The maximum weāve had on a training was about 8 I think, with a capacity of 12. Weāve 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 āpoor qualityā provider in Mountain Trainingās eyes, which is not good for our overall relationship with the NGB.
For those that donāt know, HQAC hold the āprovidershipā - i.e. they are the ābusinessā under which all courses are run. Course directors are then appointed to a provider - so itās 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.
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 donāt mind sifting through applications. It doesnāt take that long.
Likewise it would be great if an update to the āmasterā SMS app pulls through to the Cadet Portal as Sqns donāt always (rarely?) update it. One for @james_elliott?
Topic drift - I know - the above wonāt deal with staff quals but maybe the new staff portal will.
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.
Course content is exactly the same. Itās not set by us.
Having other CFs along is easy. Having other organisations along gets challenging because of insurance - Iām sure itās not an unsolvable problem but youād probably end up having to purchase PLI/PI insurance for the course directors & staff.
Not at all. Iād far rather people did the course - I donāt care where they do it - as long as they end up with the qual and getting cadets out. Thatās the rub really - we can provide the courses internally, but they will be subject to all of the limitations of volunteers & organisational faff. But theyāll be uber cheap / free. Commercial courses - more are available, but you gotta cough up for them.
Another option, especially for courses that arenāt 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.
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.
Exactly this, I donāt care who provided the Course as long as itās from the NGB, thatās why working to the NGB standard rather than our own is so important.
But if you go outside it does start to cost, I know an ML who having done his training with HQAC decided he wanted to go with a private provider for his ML assessment, he had nothing against HQAC he just wanted to go somewhere special and do things his way. (For those who do an ML it is a big life moment). It cost him over Ā£1000 (Iāve seen the photos and it was probably worth every penny to him), but thatās well in excess of 30 times what it wouldāve cost to do it with the organisation.
The alternative is running Staff Courses during the School Holidays and not running Cadet activities.
Not an issue as long as your happy to lose out on those Cadet Camps and Gold Expeditions.for the benefit of having more staff to run Bronze Expeditions etc.
The Air Cadets: what adult instruction could we offer to benefit the others? The only practical, easily accessible aerospace training we could offer is something groundschool/drone based - and we are limited in what we could offer thereā¦
ACTO 075 for drone based training is fine, but staff training is easily self taught and completed with the CAA anyway - any other aerospace or flying training is highly specialist and requires huge investment in equipmentā¦
We simply donāt have something to offer in returnā¦?
Weāve mentioned before about a root and branch review of what we offer, and how we do thingsā¦
Now this is not my opinion, as I believe giving a full and rounded cadet experience is essentialā¦ but is there not an argument for dropping AT/Fieldcraft/shooting etc.
When Timmy joins wanting to shoot; go to the army cadetsā¦
But at the same time ensure that we are able to offer several AEF flights (per cadet in a year) several glider flights (per cadet in a year) and purely aviation/aerospace themed training program.
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