I know it is a rule, but I have to wonder why it is an actual rule. Squadrons are capable of prioritising their flyers, but if you only have 4 able to attend for 4 allocated slots and one has only been in for 2½ months then we lose a slot or have to faff around trying to pass it to another unit.
(our flying allocations tend to be based on a “car-full”)
Intersting. Thanks
The 13 and 3 rule has been in place for years and I’d assumed that it was based on the starting age of 13 then 3 months to complete the minimum training that was required before AEF. Perhaps the age rule should be reviewed now that we have 12 as the starting age?
It was reviewed and they decided to keep it at 13&3.
Most of the 12 year olds we get through the door wouldn’t be big enough for the parachute, so it would rule them out of AEF at least.
Glad it was considered. There is a degree of maturity needed to get the most out of AEF. 13&3 can be a long wait for some cadets unfortunately.
As others have already said, it is in ACTO 31/32 policy as a key requirement. Bader IT applications implement existing policy (which is normally available) and we don’t make anything up as that leads to all sorts of problems 
IMHO, the 12 weeks thing is there because cadets attending said events should be sufficiently educated on how to wear their uniform, who to salute or not, how to behave etc so they don’t make fools of themselves and their units when they attend the establishment. Most units will cover this in the first three months and if they are not, one could come to the conclusion that they should be.
This is covered in 2nd class training, why bother adding additional time on top of this (assuming it’s done within 12 weeks)?
It doesn’t really matter, how many flying slots do you get each year that you have the luxury of offering them to your brand new cadets?
Unfortunately, whilst this new functionality may address some eligibility issues re AEF and AEG there are many other pitfalls that portal will not cover that may preclude flying.
As soon as cadets hit 14/15 it gets very difficult for them to get the time off school to go, it’s only the 13 year olds who find it easy to get their schools to let them go.
Might not be the case nationally, but we’ve had a few cadets who have had the request from us (with proper letters and everything) turned down.
Not that many, but as a small sqn we’ve had to turn down a cadet from going who’d been in 10 weeks. We couldn’t get another cadet to fill that space, as sad as that is.
Can you take your discussions to a different thread so this is kept for SMS please
You know what would be super useful @james_elliott?
A button that deletes all units with no cadets or staff on an event.
This would save me approximately 1 billion clicks (2 per unit deletion) when I have to remove all of the units who haven’t bid so I don’t have loads of outstanding travel declarations. Especially for a Regionally advertised event. It’s literally taking forever.
It would be better to only require a declaration from units with attending personnel!
Not saying the button wouldn’t be a good idea too, though!
This is another option of course… but it doesn’t help my OCD when I want to tidy the event list up…
Let’s have both - an easy option to clean up and no red flag for units with no one attending.
Also - bulk update flying logs
That’s already there on the event…
Yes - I was mentioning that it was possible rather than requesting