Academy Update

brihard wrote: I finally got my date. Mid April I head off to Depot for six months of full time training. I'll be part of a troop of 24 candidates. In one of those bizarre small world things, a guy from the other end of the country who I did my infantry sergeant's course will be in my troop as well. I can't wait to get started.

That's awesome bri!

My cousin was one of two out of 100 to be chosen for the RCMP Musical Ride a few weeks ago.

impulse418 wrote: Why did you have a run in with the cops Reb?

Oh, yes. that.

Well, since I ditched my car back in January, I had to borrow my father's until we could get a new one (waited on tax return)

Well, I didn't realize it, but the plate lamp in the back was out, and on the way home from academy one night, I got pulled over by a state trooper for it. He told me the lamp was out, saw my hat and gear bag from the academy, and asked if I was in training. When I said I was, he told me 'This stop never even happened.' He got in his car and left.

I still had to report to the academy any police contact, citations or not, so I sent the appropriate email, but there was also a verbal directive to call and leave a message, no matter what time of day or night, which I didn't do. And got busted bad for it. I was almost given demerits, but instead was directed to write the rules and regulations section on police contact 5 times by hand.

Why did you have a run in with the cops Reb?

We lost a guy to academics a few weeks ago, and it just so happened that his exit was the most humiliating thing I've ever witnessed.

A few of us got called to the director's office (I had a bit of an issue with police contact the night before) and this guy was one of them. The rest of the class went to the training room to get ready for a gear inspection. They school circled, and waited for those of us in the office to come back.
I got called first, got a minor ass chewing, and sent back to the room.

Well, this guy who failed the test (this was his second failure) was the last one called into the office, and therefore the last one back to the training room. He was dismissed while he was in there. The poor bastard had to come into the room, walk across it in front of everyone, pick up his gear bag, about face, and leave the room....with everyone looking on. There wasn't anyone who didn't feel sorry for him.

He was our last dismissal.

The one before that was our real dead-weight guy, and since then, even though there's 28 of us left, there's no real anchors.

....That's still more friendly a term than the one I wanted to use. 

usafpilot07 wrote: How's it hanging Reb? We just got through driving this week. Really, really long days, but it was a blast. Easily the most fun I've had so far. 9 weeks down, 7 to go.

We're down to 28 from 40, and we're doing a lot of classroom stuff at the moment. In about 2 weeks we start defensive tactics, and its a bit more of a relaxed atmosphere than what we're dealing with now.

The only real problem I have is one of our DIs doesn't communicate with the directors, and contradicts directives we get from them, then reflects his failure to talk to them or clarify orders back on us. If he walks in the door for uniform inspections, we're going to get yelled at.

If any of the other ones are there, we might get gigged for infractions, but its not the 'end of the world' yelling that the other guy does.

I know it seems stupid to complain about being yelled by a DI, since...well, that's their job- but there's a lot of 'chicken-crap' that he pulls, even two months into the game.
We're constantly getting paperwork back for spelling errors or grammatical mistakes. Problem is, the paperwork is graded by different people each time- so what one person sees as okay this time, gets marked as a mistake next time...and each time you get it handed back to you, you have to do a handwritten copy of the assignment.

Case in point:

-We were given a quiz on a section of the rules and regulations - Write the section verbatim.
-The section includes a comma after a certain word, which I stuck in...since, you know...its there.
-I lose half a point on the quiz because the 'comma doesn't belong there.'
-I rewrite the quiz, leaving out the comma as directed, and add my handwritten copy.
-Paperwork comes back for the missing comma, now I get to retype it, and add TWO handwritten copies.

....they did this to at least three other people in the class.
 
Aside from that- all is well. I don't mind the physical stuff and have gotten my run time down to well below what I need it to be to graduate. I've cliqued with a few of the other older guys in there, and we run together and sort of help each other through some of the other stuff.
I'm glad I'm doing it, and have long ago hit that point where I said "I ain't gonna quit" - but man, if I DONT happen to make it through, I don't know if I could go through it all over again!

Glad you're heading to the home stretch- I almost wish we were doing a full time schedule, we'd be nearly finished by now. Instead, its just dragging along painfully.

usafpilot07 wrote: deadeye007 wrote: usafpilot07 wrote: We're in firearms this week. The simulator is pretty freaking sweet. After a day on the simulator/doing dry runs, I'm terrified of being around our weak link with live ammunition involved, but I'm really excited to be out of the range for 3 more days. <span ="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre">     </span> Did they use a FATS system? The one I did a month ago had machine set up that shot me in the shin with a rubber pellet. I couldn't get myself in the mood to hide behind a plastic box as "cover". We had it activated, but I didn't get shot. My dad went through the same BLET program(and actually went through it with another cadet's dad, which is kind of cool), so they kind of threw me some more complex ones during mine just to mess with me, and I think they took it easy on me with the FATS because of that. 3/5 of my scenarios were ones with another officer being held hostage in one way or another.  I did have to shoot a really really hot girl in one of the others though, that was weird. We finished up qualifying tonight. Pretty sure I lost "Top Gun" by one second in the tie breaker.

deadeye007 wrote: usafpilot07 wrote: We're in firearms this week. The simulator is pretty freaking sweet. After a day on the simulator/doing dry runs, I'm terrified of being around our weak link with live ammunition involved, but I'm really excited to be out of the range for 3 more days. <span ="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre">     </span> Did they use a FATS system? The one I did a month ago had machine set up that shot me in the shin with a rubber pellet. I couldn't get myself in the mood to hide behind a plastic box as "cover".

We're in firearms this week. The simulator is pretty freaking sweet.

Its beyond the point where we want him to shape up. We want him gone, and I'm pretty close to endorsing any physical suggestions that someone wants to offer.