In AFROTC there are many opportunities to stay busy and involved with the program with various activities that the Detachment is involved in. Some of the common activities that are often taking place are Community service events, fund raisers and Morale events. For community service events cadets will do a variety of things to help the local area in its quest to build better citizens for America. Some of these events include Visiting and spending time at the Veterans hospital, visiting and playing games with children that are ill at the University Hospital, helping out at the local salvation army, working with habitat for humanity, and doing the local Polar Plunge. These are just a few of the many activities that we stay actively involved with.
For fund-raising, cadets wage a major leaf raking campaign in the local area come mid fall, working with ESPN during football games, working for the Big Ten Network for basketball games, and a number of other events. These events are usually are pretty fun and get you a lot of opportunities to get into places and be in situations that you wouldn't normally get to experience were you just a part of the crowd.
For Morale events cadets often get together to have cook-outs, softball and football games, trivia nights, ping-pong tournaments, and movie nights. The type and length of events vary based on who is charge of setting up the events, what fits into the budget, and what is being done for the event. Morale event generally take place about once or twice a month and are usually a pretty good time just to hang out with everybody in a different environment for a change.
Another activity that the Detachment is also involved in is a joint agreement with CAP where cadets are able to go up with members of CAP on sortie rides and get a little bit of flying in. During these CAP events cadets get an orientation on the aircraft and then are taken up and usually given an opportunity to take the controls of the aircraft.
Apart from those events, there are also special LLAB's that include Dining-In, which is an informal military dinner complete with silly customs and the infamous Grog bowl; Dining-Out, which is the formal send off to our graduating seniors and our awards ceremony complete with guest speaker; career night, which consists of active Air Force Officers coming in to speak with cadets about different career fields and opportunities within the Air Force; and finally paintball. All these events are a lot of fun and are really rewarding to attend and get to see the more personal, fun, and lighter sides of the program.
So AFROTC really is a busy place with a lot of opportunity to get involved and to do something for fun and for others. Though not all these events are mandatory the question really is who would want to pass up some of these chances to be a part of something that most people only wish they could get the chance to do.
Polar Plunge
Special Olympics