Doing one of these big ticket courses was certainly one of the primary reasons I stayed past-18 and eventually got roped into being staff…
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Wonder how the cost compares to a flying scholarship (or indeed GS)?
picked purely as it is closest to Cranwell as a civilian BGA club a 5 day gliding course is £500
details here> http://www.buckminstergc.co.uk/courses/
(includes up to 5 x flights/day = 25 flights)
So i would hope 8-9 hours with a VGS to get each student to solo level would be no more than the same £500 not taking into account MOD economics where even the most basic 49p item will be charged at £2.50…!
if each fight is assumed to be 20 minutes, thus 25 flights in the week is 500minutes or 8hours20
Matt asks an interesting question
how much benefit does the population/country/economy/etc see by producing 100s of Cadets who have gone solo via a GS and thus inspired into the aviation industry and potentially becoming professional or private pilots (like i was) than 50-60 or so young “Leaders and managers” from a JL course…
read the GA magazines and you’ll soon find complaints that the UK aviation industry is being left behind in terms of the number of pilots we’re producing (professional/commercial pilots and private) and many put it down to the lack of hands on aviation from time with the ATC - many of today’s pilots first sat in an aircraft because of their time in the ATC
Can the same be said for the top leaders, business managers and executives in that they have got to where they have because of the leadership and management skills learnt in the ATC?
perhaps too soon to judge the legacy of the JL course…?
Whilst this may be true, I don’t imagine the ever-increasing costs of becoming a commercial pilot have helped things.
The actual cost is relatively low compared to training an RAF pilot.
Rather different original budgets and end purposes, though, no?
Train an RAF pilot circa £3 million civil pilot to ATPL circa £80k, doesn’t stop Air Tanker recruiting qualified A330 pilots for the Voyager fleet through reserve service.
RAF recruiter at our unit recently quoted it as being £6m, but this will vary depending on stream.
Pardon my ignorance, but what exactly is covered by the JL course? No detail should be considered too specific.
Gold leadership syllabus
Fieldcraft
Practical application of the leadership principles in the fieldcraft environment
In a nutshell.
Open to all cadet forces too!
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Looking at @bob1 answer regarding JL course content- why isn’t a course like this available for CFAVs to do?
Yes, OIC and SSIC are technically development courses, but imagine the confidence and skills that could come from a similar course to JL for CFAVs?
I may be being very optimistic here and borderline hinting on reserve forces training, but imagine a course that can qualify a CFAV to teach basic levels of most activities such as fieldctaft etc rather than the current system of separate courses for everything.
I’d be interested. As a newly appointed junior officer, I currently feel like a spare part at present.
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+1. I feel that we could do more in terms of staff courses. The focus should always be on cadets, but staff training and enthusiasm has a massive impact on cadets.
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Main word being training. Like I say courses like JL but for CFAVs could be incredibly beneficial.
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From experience here, but prior to the change to the FT policy, it was very difficult for us to try to get enough interest within the wing to run a staff FT weekend. Now it’s basically policy to do so, and uptake is still slow on people wanting to (re)qualify.
However, the course essentially does now run with a relaxed and low-key ft training weekend element - with rifles, but dry. I have put the idea forward to our wing FTO that it would be possible and beneficial to incorporate a small-scale (even just 10 rounds each) blank exercise finale to get a bit of buzz into the instructors about all that stuff.
We run leadership courses for inexperienced staff - low uptake.
First Aid courses are pretty easy to fill - because we have to have first aid and there’s value in it for a broader demographic.
For the most part, you’ve really got to go seeking opportunities for your own development and oftentimes it won’t be as a student on a course - it will be shadowing or assisting DS on a course and building up until your delivering parts of it… etc.
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See the current reinvention of the wheel wrt to FT has led me to walk away completely. I’ve been trained as an ECO twice, I’m not doing it again.
I know a few that have stated that they will not be retraining, although they were only AI. Same goes for a couple people I know whose shooting quals lapsed at various points for a variety of reasons.
Why are you being made to as an ECO? Are they getting you under the “current and competent” line and saying you haven’t exercised he qualification enough?
No one has made any decision as to what’s happening in my Wing at the moment, no explanation has been forthcoming as to how the changes work or are supposed to work. At this rate the whole Wing will be come under current and competent at as there have been no deployed Exes within the last year. (We were the only ones running them at Squadron level and Wing have done the square root of nothing at all times).
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Taken to messages.
I’ve only known 3 cadets do JL over the years and not one of them has stayed much beyond completion. The longest stayed due to a knock back from the RM due to an injury, once that was cleared up he wasn’t around long and due to working his squadron didn’t see much of him before that and never saw him after.
We put too much store in cadets staying on and inducing them to stay by loading them with things, that while they may have some value in “civilian life” don’t really and are only any real use within the Air Cadets or maybe another youth organisation for 99.999% of cadets. The things we do which are most useful in a “civilian life” are the things that you can’t do a course in.
I doubt many cadets will have the nous to try and use a useful qualification NGB AT related or say Archery in some way to find gainful employment. You don’t see it in staff. We can train and or enable them to get things, but unless they stay in the ATC we and they have been urinating into wind in terms of actual usefulness. But we kid ourselves differently. The argument as to whether we should or not, should be based on how willing or able are they to complete it. We had two start doing a BELA, but both got jobs and that was end of that, their retailer employers wouldn’t give them the time off.
As for training for staff I think most staff are fed up with losing weekends or part weekends for something that is only of use within the bubble and may only do it because it’s for the cadets, but have no real interest. As said people only do first aid because they have to, not because they have any personal need. FMS or whatever it may be called is probably the prime example as it seems to have been constantly rebooted with a new set of conditions and courses. There is only one FMS bod in our area and no other staff are remotely interested. Our bloke has said no as he’s done it all before and has no confidence that it won’t change again. The only thing now is ticking boxes on a matrix.
Maybe FMS is something to sell to cadets as they are more likely to be excited by it. But again it has no value outside the ATC. You can add bits like ILM, but unless the cadets have the basic recognised relevant qualifications, experience etc very few employers will even look at them.