AIR FORCE TRAINING

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 13433, 21 April 1944, Page 2

AIR FORCE TRAINING

VALUE IN CIVILIAN TRADES

HIGH STANDARD MAINTAINED

Although changes have been made from time to time in the location in which pre-entry training has been given to personnel of the Royal New Zealand Air Force, there has been no variant in the standard which the trainees must reach. In an interview, the . Director of the R.N.Z.A.F. Educational Services, Wing Commander E. Caradus, pointed out that the main purpose of the courses is to enable the R.N.Z.A.F. to obtain qualified men of the right type, but that at the same time the training they receive is an excellent preparation for return to civil life.

“The training given in the various Air Force technical training schools,” he said, “is superimposed on the preliminary basic training in general mathematics and elementary science. This ensures that an Air Force trained tradesman is often much better equipped than the corresponding tradesman in civil life. The training in the Air Force is more thorough and more intensive. No essentials are omitted, and 100 per cent. accuracy is stressed throughout. “The same applies to aircrew trainees. Many of the men selected for aircrew are being given a standard of education which they did not previously possess, and most of them appreciate this opportunity to the full. Even the first stages of training—that given in the aircrew pre-entry course —provides many men with a general mathematical and scientific training that will open up new fields of opportunity for them, when they return to civil jobs. In most cases it will make them more competent workers at whatever job they may be employed. Many men have indicated their de-

sire to finish the course, even war should end to-morrow.

“It will be apparent,” Wing mander Caradus concluded, with a training course c nearly forty hours a week no time or desire for further __ Consequently, while they ar , aD d training, men are not al v# {nrare not encouraged, to ta e tuDither study, though ample op ties for recreational iea 1 n j D g provided . It is when t e Recourse has been complete sta bon man has been posted to a^ QVti gethat he is given eveiy ® jjament to utilise his spaie 1 |jg c atio»® proving his particular qua into and thus facilitate his en [ g civilian occupation when won.