My oldest son was in the Civil Air Patrol at Hanscom for several years right up until the pandemic hit. It is kind of like a Jr. ROTC program so there is military structure of uniforms, saluting protocols, etc. around the program. I believe you can attend several sessions before actually joining to make sure that the prospective cadet can embrace the structure of the program.
As for the actual program, their primary goal is flying. It provides many opportunities to fly. They try to get you up in the air as soon as possible. Then during the "mandatory boot camp" for cadets on the Cape they get the cadets up in Blackhawks. One of the best things about the program is the summer program. During the summer the cadets apply to different camps and if they are accepted based upon rank and seniority then they can learn some amazing stuff. My son went to VT for a week of glider school pilot training. Every day he was launched multiple times in a glider. Then another camp was survival/medic school at Hawk Mountain Ranger School in PA. https://www.capranger.org There is so much more I could go on about but one thing to note that CAP is a lot like the Boys scouts in that the amount of fun activities is highly contingent on the adult volunteer supervisors. There is a natural ebb and flow of some of the quantity and quality of the adult volunteers so some of the academic year was not quite as fulfilling as other years. The one slightly negative that I think I should point out is that some of the cadet peer group are very motivated to go into the service but not through ROTC or Officer training school but directly at 18. So my son met and associated with many teenagers that were "gun-ho" (we were in the still in Iraq) cadets that were very excited for military action in Iraq. This is especially true in the summer camps where the students come from all over the country. Even some of the adult volunteers were former military guys that were still quite hard core. RE: math and science. The Navy has the same cadet program with even more summer programs. It is called SeaCadets. They are out of the north shore, boston and there is one out of the south-shore. No aviation during the school year but more opportunity for summer camp aviation. There is also a very selective science camp at the Naval Academy at Annapolis every year. Fantastic program. On Mon, Dec 11, 2023 at 12:50 PM kliattaudi--- via Lincoln < [email protected]> wrote: > My 14 year old grandson is interested in aviation and math and science and > is considering joining the Cadet program at Hanscom. Does anyone have any > experience with the program either positive or negative? any information > would be most welcome > Jean Palmer > Tower Rd. > -- > The LincolnTalk mailing list. > To post, send mail to [email protected]. > Browse the archives at https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/private/lincoln/ > . > Change your subscription settings at > https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/lincoln. > >
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