Your EAA AirVenture Oshkosh Chapter Checklist

June 2021 – Looking forward to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2021 is an understatement! We here in the Chapters department on staff at EAA can’t wait for AirVenture to get here! If there can be a sense of normalcy for many of us, attending AirVenture and meeting up with our chapter friends defines that normalcy. So, what can we expect for chapters and chapter networking at AirVenture? Here is your EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2021 checklist! Be sure to hit each of these during your AirVenture experience.

• Camp With Your Fellow Chapter Members

  Many chapters begin the AirVenture experience by traveling to AirVenture as a chapter, camping at AirVenture as a chapter, followed by having fun at AirVenture as a chapter. As we say around here, chapters are like a three-legged stool, having a social leg, an aviation leg, and an educational leg. All three legs make the stool stand. Forming up in Camp Scholler is an experience in itself, and our chapters have so much fun. I’ve already been invited by one of our Missouri chapters to their annual shrimp barbeque dinner in Camp Scholler. Not only does the chapter know how to most efficiently make the best use of every square inch on a cook top, their griddle of choice is the EAA rotary pancake griddle serving double duty for the chapter.

• Support Chapters While Enjoying a Hot Breakfast Every Morning

  Each morning one of our EAA chapters hosts a delicious pancake breakfast for Camp Scholler campers as a fundraiser. These breakfasts are open to all, and are located at the Camp Scholler Chapters Pavilion in the northeast corner of the campground. Get your hot breakfast and support chapters every morning. New this year, scrambled eggs are included!

• Visit the Blue Barn

  The EAA Blue Barn, home of Chapters and Young Eagles at AirVenture, is a must-stop location. Be sure to pin your chapter location with a mini windsock on our giant map, and enter to win a new TIG welder for your chapter, provided by Lincoln Electric. Catch an informative chapter-related forum and get answers to all your Chapters and Young Eagles program-related questions from our staff and volunteers.

  Each year, we have a center section in the barn as a focal point. This year, we are focusing on our newest youth program offerings to chapters, EAA Young Eagles Workshops and our RC modeling program, the EAA Young Eagles Build and Fly. Chapters are invited to bring and display their own RC chapter-built airplanes and their chapter youth projects, meaning anything a chapter offers kids to build during their aviation day camp programs. Bring it and share it for all barn visitors to see.

  Enjoy seeing the creativity of chapters around the country as you admire the Adirondack chairs they’ve built, decorated, and brought for display in the Blue Barn. Many are outfitted with unique chapter logos and insignia. We’ve been receiving phone calls from chapters who are eager to bring theirs. I have heard that one chapter is even incorporating a drink holder in their chair this year! Not bad!

  Finally, make sure to pick up your chapter file. In an effort to clean out some of the storage areas at HQ, we are offering to all chapters the chance to claim their chapter file containing things like yearly renewal reports, news items, and such. There may be information that is of interest to you in your file so make a point to pick it up at the Blue Barn.

• Visit the RC Airplane Flying Field

  EAA’s night air shows are not to be missed, however we have other nightly flying to consider. Be sure to participate in our evening RC model airplane flying at the EAA RC Flying Field behind the EAA Aviation Museum. Beginning at around 7:30 pm, we will have our EAA RC airplane at the field. Chapters are welcome to bring their own chapter-built RC plane and fly as well.

• Participate in Chapter and Young Eagles Awards Ceremonies

  Volunteers have been the heart and soul of EAA since the founding of the organization in 1953. Volunteers have played an especially important role in the growth of EAA’s nearly 900 chapters. Help thank those volunteers who make the chapter network one of aviation’s strongest communities by attending yearly chapter and Young Eagles awards ceremonies.

  • Chapter Leaders Breakfast – Pre-registration required. Join us for the annual EAA Chapter Leaders Breakfast and Awards Ceremony at the EAA Aviation Museum on Saturday, July 31 at 8 a.m. Click here to learn more and to pre-register. Attendance is limited.
  • Young Eagles Awards Ceremony – Open to all. Join us on Wednesday, July 28, beginning at 5:30 p.m. at Theater in the Woods to congratulate this year’s recipients of our EAA Young Eagles volunteer awards.
  • Young Eagles Coordinator Luncheon – Pre-registration required. If you are an EAA Young Eagles program coordinator, AirVenture is a great time to meet and discuss the EAA Young Eagles program with other program coordinators. Join us on Tuesday, July 27, at 10 a.m. at the PHP Conference Center Tent. Meet our program sponsors and others who support our mission. Join us in recognizing our program volunteers and help us congratulate our 2021 program award winners. Click here to learn more and to pre-register.This event is limited to EAA Young Eagles coordinators, Y.E. pilots, and Y.E. ground volunteers, and the number of participants is limited.
  
  
• Attend the Chapter Leaders Corn Roast

  The Chapter Leaders Corn Roast is a simple “thank you” event to chapter officers for their dedicated involvement. The “corn feed” is on Sunday, July 25, at 5 p.m. at the Camp Scholler Chapters Pavilion. Pre-registration is required as seats are limited. Click here to learn more and to pre-register.

With every day that passes, the excitement to be reunited with our aviation family as a whole and our chapter family specifically grows as we look forward to the World’s Greatest Aviation Celebration! We know you share this anticipation and we can’t wait to see you in a month!