Standardised Training

[cplPONTI]

news down south is that all new recruits are to be trained together for a period of 2 weeks (on the island as far as i know) and then will have 1 week at annual camp with their parent unit to carry out specialised courses such as 1st aid etc. any of the other lads down south hear anything about this

[ODIN]

is that all the battalions in the south??i'm in the DFTC at the moment and we heard we were in the glenn for camp this yr with the other units in the DFTC.....but i did hear a romour about the island

[hptmurphy]

yep thats what I heard a couple of weeks back......ah! two weeks in Bere Island......no thanks,,,,where is my PSO?

[trellheim]

not this oul shite again ?


Meet the same boss same as the old boss. :wink:

[Docman]

news down south is that all new recruits are to be trained together for a period of 2 weeks

First I have heard of it but then again, this idea has been floating around for years. Won't work. Until the system of recruit training is standardised amonst units, there cannot be a Recruit camp for all units. Even within Bns at the moment, there is a huge range of capabilities between recruits. In some Coys, recruits are taken on in Sept and trained for the full year and then go to Recruit camp in July where they are trained together with recruits who have barely been sworn in. It is extremely demoralising for well trained recruits who have several months under their belt, ARPs, Exercises etc to go back to learning left from right. We have even had a case where a recruit knew far more about the Steyr than the Cpl training him in the steyr.

Until Recruitment and Recruit training is standardised, there cannot be a Bde Recruit camp that works. In fact, until all training is standardised, there is no point in Bde recruit camps.

[ODIN]

My POTS course was done on a Bde bases this year.....a bit of a farce....one instructor didn't know how to strip a steyr at all....I agree that things will have to be standardised....in my own battalion i know of at least 2 variations of the present arms movement

[DeV]

My recruit camp was a 1 week brigade affair, along with around 100 others in 1999. It was excellent & well run, with good instructors. Even though I had been in about 6 months at that stage and learnt 2/3 new things.

A two week centralised recruit camp at brigade level is an excellent idea. It means the units can concentrate on training the rest of the troops, rather that just doing the basics all the time. But it is dependant on a good sized location with good section rooms and adequate sized square. In addition to well selected and prepared instructors.

The way it worked was each unit in the brigade sent all their recruits up. The unit running it provided the HQ staff and all of the 3 platoon commanders (I think). The Infantry units provided the platoon sergeants and section commanders.

[apod]

Ncos in the pdf have to prove their level of instruction is up to standard before any of them are allowed instruct cadets or pots.Why doesnt the rdf do this? :confused:

[Joshua]

Doc, in my old unit, nco's are handpicked for training recruits. We believe that recruits require a solid grounding and would only place knowledgeable nco's over them.

On behalf of those involved in recruit training,I demand an apology for your remarks.

[Docman]

Doc, in my old unit, nco's are handpicked for training recruits. We believe that recruits require a solid grounding and would only place knowledgeable nco's over them.

On behalf of those involved in recruit training,I demand an apology for your remarks.

Now that I've reread the post, it is a flawed argument and makes a lot of generalisations based on observations.
Apologies

[Joshua]

For Gods sake, I was trying to get a bit of an argument/discussion going!

I demand you retract that apology.

[greyfox]

thats the scuttlebut all right told about it couple of months back, i think there looking for the same ncos for 6 weeks on the Rock bere island to premote a standard level of training ,good concept?,
hope that any ncos selected would be trained / tested as well beforehand as well

[Alf]

Well as a recruit I wouldn't particularly mind being milled off for a few weeks solid training where I could learn everything in one sold go. Once a week and then weekends all over the shop is not really enough to learn it comprehensively, and thus you can get guys who still can't cop the commands a fair way in. Do it every morning on the dot for 14 days and I'd bet you'd never have trouble taking commands on the square again.

[Barry]

We have even had a case where a recruit knew far more about the Steyr than the Cpl training him in the steyr.

*cough* Sounds familiar *cough*

I'd love to take 6 weeks off to go down to Bere Island and get screamed at, but the basic fact is that I can't. I, like the vast majority of recruits, have a little thing called 6th year, and the Leaving Cert, that is dominating my life right now. Basic fact is that my leaving cert is going to take precidence over the RDF every time, unless the RDF can get me a degree in Engineering, and a full time job (a Cadetship doesn't count ).

Plus, you'd never get the mandays, so there's no point fantasizing

[Alf]

Well one thing that the leaving cert kiddies like us do have as an advantage is all those bloody holidays we get strewn about the place. Now yes, dragging up NCO's to actually train you during this time could be fun, but it's time the army could look into exploiting.

But even generally a better and faster trained cadre of gunners means more time between getting stars and going on to get stripes as well as keeping up retention rates and so on - basically making the RDF look more like the PDF, which works then into integration and so on.