Target shooting and clay target shooting is a sport… service rifle shooting however, is not.
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Hi, I would be interested to know what drone you are using. Many thanks
This one was posted previously, can’t recall if it was GoodEgg or someone else, but suggested it could be used indoors.
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I’ve got it and it’s great for indoors. On a squadron you’d benefit from getting the 6 way battery charger and a load of spare batteries too.
Some thought also needs to go in to laying out a course for cadets to fly - eg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zroJGehvQpY
We arent. But are now looking at what goodegg reccomended.
I’m not sure I want to put this in a new thread, and here seems a good enough fit:
I did some dangerous thinking off the back of the ACF Media thread.
Being realistic, flying will never be sufficient for us as an activity to consider it a raison d’etre or attract (or at least keep) those who only want to fly. And the academics won’t engage a sufficient number to remain viable.
So, let’s drop the pretence and foster the spirit of the RAF’s expeditionary side, and work out how to get every new cadet everywhere in the country access to a minimum of one flight, one fieldcraft weekend, one wht and shoot, one adventure training walk, one float or sink, one climb or coasteer, one cycle ride, one road march, EFA, Blue Leadership, Blue Radio, swimming proficiency, Bronze Cyber, and one full week away within 12 months, plus revamped 1st Class training.
At the end of 12 months, report on any gaps - “offered, not interested”, “wasn’t available to attend”, “insufficient places on activity”. Act on findings - this could be immediately implemented on the understanding that completion of the targets will be low, but at least we can statistically identify the postcode lottery and review the strategy and areas of focus.
Outside of that, you build the development through each category and catch all those with specific interests, now able to go further and deeper into each subject to cater to those specific interests and create cadet specialists. By the time they are 18 they are bona fide instructors in whatever area(s) they’ve progressed through and not just someone who knows a bit having done it a few time - so we have staff cadets who are actually useful staff, and/or we have potential CFAV who are ready to rock. Having reached those levels, we’re probably more likely to retain post 18/20 or at least see return later. Our output into the world (civ or mil) is magnitudes greater, and we might just be able to legitimately self-brand ourselves internally as “the best cadet force”.
We can have cyber, we can have space, we can have the academic stuff - propulsion, airframes, weaponry, history, principles of flight, air power. We can take each one from a really basic level to be delivered in the 1st 12 months by an imbecile instructor and take it all the way up to an advanced level self-teach that we have little hope of getting enough instructors for beyond a specialist national/regional camp. Because we can get shooting bods, FT instructors, AT instructors, flying instructors…
If the capacity were there, I would not care if I had 200 paying cadets where after the first 12 months 20 only turned up to fieldcraft, 10 to anything aircraft related, 15 were living full time on the moor, 40 weren’t attending and were self studying at home, 25 only did sports, 10 sitting quietly in a corner every night making models and getting giddy on glue fumes until a member of staff opens the window they “forgot” to open, 5 were producing a documentary about the local airfield during WW2, 30 maniacs were doing everything, 10 had done everything they wanted and were now purely instructors, and 35 were brand new - with a smattering of actual factual leadership, training, sports leader, amateur radio, shooting, flying, and AT quals among them.
If there was a desire, we really could do it - and with our head start from having dipped toes in each for decades we should be able to do it faster and better than anyone else who tried.
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A lot of that used to be called annual camp.
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…yes and so many more hearts to add
As a CI in the past we didn’t see cadets most days as they used to be working in sections on the stations, cadets on the flight lines with the line crews, one cadet did nights with the RAFP, cadets on hardstandings as Vulcan’s started up at 05:00 as they went on exercise. As a cadet I did a day in the station med centre. One cadet spent a week in the airman’s mess and went onto to be an RAF Chef after the experience.
Annual camp was much more fun then for everybody, staff and cadets.
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Isn’t this supposed to “the Cadet experience” that they went on about a few years ago?
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To do that needed staff with all the right qualifications but some of these weren’t, really available and far too inspirational than deliverable.
But as said much of this could be covered off in one week at an annual camp, like what we used to do.
Yes, but perhaps that’s where some complacency came in - camp places have been waning for a long time and the organisation hasn’t been proactive enough in filling the gaps.
Annual camp certainly used to be where everyone would get a taste and then wing events could be shaped differently with different “marketing”, some places still run multi activity weeks that fill some of those gaps, but maybe we’ve been too blasé about “build it and they will come” with regard to activities - too sporadic and well intentioned, but with limited drive and little response to the less fortunate in terms of instructors. I’m talking generally as an organisation, because as said some places have been better for (e.g.) numerous fieldcraft and shooting weekends per year and/or multi activity camps.
With fieldcraft and I’m sure shooting too, it’s difficult to get past the first taste except in isolated locations that fare better with a cohesive and large enough team. You can’t just skip on because you haven’t built your pipeline so are left chasing the newbies all the time… Then your and everyone else’s pipeline gets bored and leaves putting you all back to square 1.
A lack of national support and strategy has left many floundering.
There’s also a (reasonably founded) fear of congestion or even confliction with events that we have never gotten past. If we built up and had enough throughout the year, and managed to recruit and upskill existing instructors (while making it more attractive to those less active, which is a sales and marketing, soft skills issue in some cases and a bureaucratic one in others, while some are truly maxed out) we could move past needing to avoid conflict because there would be enough choice, enough instructors, and enough cadets desiring further progression to warrant the increased output.
In the short term, I think those stuck chasing the pipeline need to lower their threshold for a viable “further development” event to get them running. By all means run ft for 12 instead of 30. Those cadets sell the activity to others, more join at the bottom, bingo you’ve now got 18 at your next stage 2. Only 6 join the first stage 3 weekend - tied in with a stage 1 or 2 weekend and suddenly the impression those 6 get is not of a “dead” activity and you can justify the instructors and logistics.
…I’m predominantly using ft as an example because I know the struggles it’s faced, but the principle equally applies to other areas.
It could be deliverable is the point, but no one at the top gripped it, they had a vision without a plan.
Had a unit OC a bit like that once:
“The plan is this…”
“Sir, that’s an idea, not the plan”
“The plan is we do that”
“How?”
Cue “that’s not quite what I meant” remarks a week later.
And that reflects the draw down the RAF has suffered from 1989.
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With all due respect…ain’t gonna happen.
You’ve listed 15 items in twelve months.
That is one experience every three weeks…and given that many are best achieved meaningfully over the course of a day that is at least one weekend a month delivering something…(on top of everything else Sqns might do eg fundraising)
As others have mentioned this requires appropriately trained/qualified staff which is unlikely to be achieved all on the same unit which adds to the challenge.
Respectfully i think we’re already offering this informally (ie without meaning to hit a set targetnof opportunities).
Our Wing SMEs are certainly delivering Wing events to get badges hsnded out etc…
If it becomes formal our Wing would just make it a “mass training weekend” where all opportunities are laid on concurrently in as few a locations as possible every other month/once a quarter - it works and makes the Wing figures look great as an SOV can be full carrying cadets to one location for three separate events…but are never run often enough or with sufficient places to meet half thr demand
I do however agree that suggesting flying/gliding is our USP when we the organisation dont own the activities and instead puppets to the RAF’s strings is a hard sell…here’s our unique opportunity that the RAF dictate what and how much can be delivered
When the RAF actually had a decent inventory of aircraft the flying side of the Air Cadets just happened. Increasingly as the RAF’s flying inventory has shrunk, they seem unable to fly what they have let alone teenagers looking for an experience. Maybe it’s time to cut the apron strings as you feel the RAF is choking us with their oversight, because I doubt we could do much worse without them. We should have more of an adult child/parent relationship.
- “access to” - they don’t have to go
- Multi Activity camps would cover off a lot of that and free up those other weekends for fundraising and sqn activities, etc
- If you look around, the output isn’t that unreasonable when you consider how much duplication of effort occurs across areas. Someone, somewhere is running something that overall generates that kind of schedule when you take the sum of all the someones and somewheres, or at the very least could if it were viable with staff and cadet numbers.
…And just because there is something on that your newbies can go to, doesn’t mean you can’t still do your bag pack - your bronze holders aren’t going on a blue weekend.
Return blues camps to the old “lived experience on an RAF station” ethos for those who want that experience, and don’t worry about running other events at the same time for those that don’t or are in their first 12 months. A large portion of most camps, and in some cases most, is made up of supplementary or irrelevant activities that are fun and everyone has a great time, but we can aspire to be more productive from a week away than 50% bowling, go karting, cinema, travelling, and visiting local (sometimes completely irrelevant to the RAF or military) attractions.
And other places aren’t, or are doing really well in some areas and completely barren in others.
The proposal is to focus attentions and strategise at a high level on increasing output in a way that levels the playing field and enables long term stability of progression, improves retention, and actually gives the organisation a purpose by simply being better.
Yes it needs more instructors and part of that can be encouraging existing instructors to do more where they can or at least adapt how they deliver to not be so insular - there are plenty that never get off their unit and units that keep to themselves, but are in the top 10 or 20% for activities and badges. If those units particularly excel in delivering something, try to encourage them to open their delivery out wider just in that one area.
It’s not an impossible future if those at the top had the vision, desire, and an actual strategy that wasn’t just “it would be awfully nice if you all could try, maybe, to do this - wouldn’t that be lovely if we could?” or “here’s a form”. Or better yet, “here’s another classroom activity and online course that will only be of interest to a minority of the minority that makes up our demographic”.
I’m being aspirational, yes, but considering there doesn’t seem to be much endeavour among the “leadership” to do anything genuinely influential other than pull the big red emergency brake on anything or issue orders and commands that reek of leather chairs and printer ink, why not be?
The itinerants from the RAF who find there way into the top jobs at HQAC, do not care what actually happens in the organisation as long as they get paid each month.
If they cared they would have put all the mechanisms for people to get trained years ago and do things to ensure they are maintained and look outside the RAF/MoD for the training to keep it going. Plus, provide the budget to make it low or no cost to CFAV.
Constantly relying on the military to deliver the training, when they are hard pushed to do what they need to for their own people, people like us playing dress up are not prioritised.
That’s a bit extreme and cynical even for me in the mood I’m currently in. I wouldn’t say they don’t care, but I don’t think they appreciate the situation and therefore make misguided attempts to rectify the wrong priorities.
or activities. I can’t help but feel that there’s a longstanding fear of too much self-sufficiency wearing thin the RAF’s willingness to continue to support us, when the reality is that the RAF support has dwindled to very little provision in relation specifically to practical delivery of our activities and training and so we’re left to suffer due to a lack of impetus at the top.
And something I meant to cover off before but forgot:
I’m not really calling for a formal policy that sets out any “you musts”, just a strategy to target areas of weakness based on local assessments, with a dynamic development model for incremental improvement of identified priorities that aspires to move towards the “everything available to everyone” model.
These thoughts stemmed from the media thread when I realised not only do we not have a beneficial national media strategy or support, but we can’t because of how much of a postcode lottery everything is.
Can i join you in Nirvana…this sounds ideal! (although i cant help thinking about the amount of admin needed…)