Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Royal Canadian Air Cadets
Royal Canadian Air Cadets is a national youth organization of close to 25,000 young men and women from 12 through 18 years of age. There are 448 air cadet squadrons located in every province and territory in Canada.
The Royal Canadian Air Cadets is made possible through a partnership between the Air Cadet League of Canada and the Canadian Forces. This is noted in Section 49 of the National Defence Act .
When the Air Cadet League of Canada was chartered on April 9, 1941, the original mandate of the Royal Canadian Air Cadets was to provide a pre-trained pool of airmen to the effort in World War II. Air Cadets now serves to teach citizenship and leadership to Canadian youth. It is a co-education organization, supervised and facilitated at the local and regional level by specially trained members of the Canadian Forces that belong to the Cadet Instructors Cadre. Air cadets are not members of the Canadian Forces, and are under no obligation to join or serve.
The aims of the Royal Canadian Air Cadets are:
- To develop, in youth, the attributes of good citizenship and leadership;
- To promote physical fitness; and
- To stimulate an interest in the air element of the Canadian Forces.
Some summer training locations are at former Royal Canadian Air Force bases such as Gimli, Manitoba or Penhold, Alberta. Other summer training takes place at active military bases such as CFB Borden.
The Royal Canadian Air Cadets form one of the three parts of Cadets Canada , which also includes Royal Canadian Army Cadets and Royal Canadian Sea Cadets.
Although the program does not actively recruit members for military service, the reason it and the national cadet programme receive over CDN$160 million per year in funding from the Department of National Defence is most definitely a recruiting program. Although the vast majority of cadets do not go on to join the Armed Forces, a significant percentage join both the regular forces and the reserves, making the $160 million a worthwhile investment for a country where military service is not a highly viewed career choice.
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