I would have to lean more to plesantly surprised, due to some creativity in the action plans. Here are my 2 cents worth.

"None of them got into the math at all"
Many searches are conducted without doing any planning or math at the onset they then find themselves after several operational periods researching areas at random because they had no method of tracking where they search and how much effort was deployed into those areas. This is when the search goes to $*&^, people start blaming each other and the operation disitigrates rapidly. Not only does the math assist SAR planning who, where and what to deploy, but it also illustrates to others what and why things were done. You may need it in court.

"no consideration of how 5 people are going to search a square mile"
This is another very common action, when your incident commander(IC) or your planners do not understand the capabilities and limitations of your teams.

"searchers in reserve"
Another topic of heated debate, I have tried this both ways and I can assure you that when the family members and the news media observes your seachers standing down for 12 hours, they will hang you out to dry. You must deploy your teams in such a way that a continued search effort is on going. Our teams are rotated in such a way that we search around the clock 24/7.

"In The Spot Light"

Excellant idea we as searchers often forget passive search techniques when in fact they do work and at a remarkably high degree in some cases.

"Confinement"
Excellant as well. I don't know how many searches could have been shortened if the initial responders would have confined the area so the search area did not grow.

"Helicopter and air support"
Another hot topic for debate, there are many variables involved with air support, the ability of the air crew, the weather, the terrain, the subject, the scenario, and on and on.
In my opinion if you have them use them but do not every bank on them totally.

"IN CONCLUSION"
It may be a difficult task to get your participants to focus on the math, because its a lot more fun to go in the field to find the subject than it is to crunch numbers.

It brings back memories of a search we had for a run-a-way where the subject was located 1500 miles away and we never deployed a search team to the field. Through investigation and SAR math and planning the subject was found.

Keep up the good work. you may want to join a team yourself!