Reserve Weekend / Part Time BMQ

[Patches]

Hi folks,

I was wondering if anyone has gone through the weekend BMQ training. How many weekends does it take roughly and how is the training sequenced (is it classroom - application or it really depends on the weekend; Is it every weekend until complete or every 3-4 weeks there is a weekend off?)

Are you travelling to the training location (Montreal based, by the way) yourself or do you make your way to your unit and travel together?

Much appreciated,

David

 

[MilEME09]

Length depends on the training schedule, while its a standardized number of training days it depends if they do 2 weekends on, 1 weekend off, or some other format. Training is a mix of classroom and hands on practical application, and drill. Travel I recommend reaching out to your unit to discuss as they will have the best information, as well as course schedule and time table.

 

[Titanicswimteam]

MilEME09 is right. I just watched a (Class A) BMQ course staff go through this process - you start with a "master schedule" and superimpose that on the reality of when the course staff are available, when the nearby range hasn't been booked, when the First Aid instructor is in town, when the training area is free, making sure you don't have "go to the range" before the class on shooting a rifle ... it is like doing a super annoying puzzle with other people looking over your shoulder telling you 'you can't put that piece there, sorry' etc. lol

The end result is a course schedule, and once the staff has had their draft approved, they will publish the dates.

Take a look at page 141 of this for a chart of career courses for Army Reservists: The Army Reserve in Canada - Soldier Information Handbook

 

[LcK_]

Hi,

I’m currently in my BMQ training (reserve week end) in Montreal area so I can answer your questions.

In my case I have 12 week end scheduled, and there is no standard about which week end is on or off.
For me it’s like this :

3 w-e on
1 off
1 on
3 off
5 on
1 off
3 on

The firsts week ends there is a lot of classroom and drill but the more you advance, the more you got practical lessons.

We all travel by ourselves, so a car is mandatory, in my case I’m lucky, my BMQ is at 10-15min from my home, but there is some people far away and it can be an hour and even more.

 

[Patches]

Appreciate all the info so far! This would be at St-Jean sur Richelieu,I imagine, right? Looking closer to an hour or more for me then haha.

 

[NavyShooter]

Weekend BMQ's require a total of 22 training days, so typically about 10-11 weekends (there are 2 variants of the schedules).

The one I'm supporting in Nova Scotia is running from January through until April, with basically 11 of 15 weekends being training weekends for the Candidates, and the Instructors doing a "Instructor Standardization Training" weekend in advance of the start of the course.

There are few of the weekends that you can miss - theoretically, you might be able to miss the first aid weekend assuming you can make it up within a year at your home unit. For the rest, you basically have to be present for all of them.

Get sick, miss a weekend? Done

Cancel a weekend due to exam stress? Done

Something personal/family related causes a missed weekend? Done

We've RTU'd 10 candidates from the course (25%) for a variety of reasons, and have just about a month left of the training. We have the Land nav Practical weekend, C-7 rifle range weekend, First Aid weekend, and Final Training Exercise weekend coming up over the next 5 weeks.

NS