Our club consists of about 40 members. We operate
from a public use airfield which is operated by one
individual who has a contract with the county.

We schedule three positions: Tow pilot, instructor,
and 'operations officer.' We operate only on weekends
year round, weather permitting.

All positions are scheduled for each quarter of the
year.

We have five or six tow pilots. One tow pilot will
be scheduled for an entire weekend day. Before the
start of each quarter, the chief tow pilot will request
days when the tow pilots can and can't fly for the
upcoming quarter and then prepare a schedule.

The similar situation occurs for instructor pilots.
We try to have one instructor on the field for each
and every weekend day. Before the start of a quarter,
the chief instructor will ask the other instructors
when they can and can't serve during the upcoming quarter.

Lastly, we have our 'Operations Officer' who really
is there to log takeoff and landing times and collect
flight fees from the pilots. They are members who
aren't tow pilots or instructors. New members have
a 'grace period' of undetermined time period. Once
the chief Operations Officer, called the Director of
Operations, thinks the newbie has been around enough
to understand 'the system', then that person joins
the pool of available manpower. And as with tow pilots
and instructors, the chief asks the pool of workers
when they can and can't serve a full day shift as Ops
officer and fills out the schedule. This is the one
position we have trouble filling, from time to time.

Tuggies and instructors are pretty darned reliable,
but the 'Ops Officer' position will, time to time,
go unfilled. Our not-too-efficient operation really
suffers without the Ops Officer. Not only do they
write down times and collect money, but the ones with
a bit of savvy will sort of keep the launch que figured
out and work expediently on retrieving gliders that
have landed and get them turned around for a launch.
Sort of. Hey, we're club members, not military and
getting us to do things in an orderly manner is like
herding cats. Almost impossible.

But, that's how we do it.

And we're always looking for a better way.

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA
North Carolina Soaring Association



At 04:18 31 August 2005, Dnewill wrote:
Our club is considering changing the way we schedule
the ground and flight
support crews ( tow, instructors, recorder, crew chief,
assistant, etc.)
Would like to find out how your club schedules the
volunteers who make it
work.
Some clubs have only the Director of Ops, Tow Pilot
and IP scheduled -- all
others are volunteers/day flyers. Others have every
position scheduled every
weekend day. Finally some do it all by a reservation
system - with those who
volunteer a specific number of hours paying less in
monthly dues than the
those who do not volunteer.

I would like to gather some details on this before
we change our system.

While answers from European and UK clubs are appreciated
- I am focused on
USA clubs - Thanks!