Experiences with Civil Air Patrol and U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary

[sanantone]

If anyone has experiences with these organizations, feel free to share. I will give my experiences. 

Civil Air Patrol

I think it's a great organization for teenagers (cadets). They can even enter the military at a higher grade after participating. For adults, however, I have been underwhelmed. Experiences do vary by squadron and location, though. 

If you love working with kids, then you might like the Civil Air Patrol. If you want to help the broader community and/or gain skills, then the Civil Air Patrol may not be worth your time. CAP is supposed to be the organization that does the most search and rescue missions in the U.S. My squadron has done none. Every meeting, after everyone gives updates on their training, the safety officer goes on and on about safety concerns involving flight. I felt like I was in a flight club. Most of the missions consist of pilots flying over areas hit by natural disasters so that aerial photographers can take pictures. Taking pictures and transporting FEMA personnel is pretty much all CAP did in response to Hurricane Harvey. 

Most of the senior officer positions do nothing, and there's hardly any training available. The IT officer does nothing and receives no training. Emergency services officers receive a lot of training they won't use. Health services officers aren't allowed to provide any healthcare. The most active specialty tracks seem to be chaplain, aerospace education (works with cadets), character development (works with cadets), and recruiting and retention. The chaplains are pretty much the only ones who regularly work with the Air Force. The Air Force stopped letting CAP members take their training classes for college credit because they didn't want to deal with so many CAP members coming on base to test. A positive about CAP is that their background check is fast. The Air Force also provides CAP with planes and vans. 

Coast Guard Auxiliary

I think you have to be at least 17 to join, but you can enter the Coast Guard at a higher grade if you completed certain auxiliary training. In the South/Southwest, it takes forever just to have a preliminary background check done. That puts you into AP (approval pending) status. I've been waiting for almost a year to just get into AP status. It takes even longer to get full approval. They aren't even doing a thorough background check; they don't ask for enough information to do anything other than run your fingerprints and check NCIC. If you don't have at least AP status, you can't do anything other than attend meetings and watch members do stuff. 

Once you are allowed to become a member, the training opportunities in in the Coast Guard Auxiliary are superior to CAP. In many cases, you receive the same training as Coast Guard members do. Auxiliarists work very closely with the Coast Guard and can take over any Coast Guard duty that doesn't involve law enforcement or going into the water. Our sector wasn't organized enough to get large numbers of auxiliarists out for Hurricane Harvey, but they expect to change that and have response teams ready to go. Since auxiliarists can do most Coast Guard jobs, it allows the Coast Guard to go out and do more rescue missions. 

Physicians, nurses, and EMTs get to actually work in Coast Guard clinics and provide care. Auxiliarists can also work as chaplains, cooks for the Coast Guard, and in a fairly new cybersecurity program. Recently, my local flotilla took part in a search and rescue mission, even though that's not the primary focus of the auxiliary. CAP, on the other hand, did nothing. I will warn, though, that you might get tired of doing and hearing about vessel safety checks. Boating safety is supposed to be the main mission of the auxiliary.

The Coast Guard does not supply the Coast Guard Auxiliary with boats, vehicles, or planes. The Coast Guard is too underfunded to do any of that. I think the reason why they let the auxiliary do so much is because they need the help.

[dfrecore]

I only have experience on the other side - my son has been a cadet in CAP for 2 years now, and absolutely loves it. He has flown a Cessna twice, and is very interested in getting his pilot's license, so the person in charge is helping him to figure out how to do it and get it all covered so he (we) don't have to come out of pocket the tens of thousands it would cost to do it on his own.

Since he wants to go into the Naval Academy when he graduates from HS in 4 years, it's a really good way to get some interesting things on his "resume" by then - lots of leadership, Color Guard, cross training with Sea Cadets/Young Marines, job training stuff, search & rescue, community service, etc. In addition to possibly getting his pilot's license before his driver's license (he's 14, that's his goal).

I really don't know what the training and situation is like for the adults in the program, but I do appreciate all the time they spend with these kids.