HamRadioNow: That ARRL Entry Level License Survey

Well you could try to explain it a different way, if indeed I am as ignorant as you make me out to be. The pretentious attitude does nothing to help communication, its like you just want to belittle anyone that doesn't agree with you.

 

Again thank you for making my point.

 

You are welcome to set up field day at my Wildlife Habitat Area. I will even cut power to the ONLY noise source around, the broadband internet. Its nice and quiet like it was 40 years ago!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

The same could be said about your argument for changing the size of the question pool. Anyone committed to passing the test will pass it.

 

The ARRL is trying to leave no stone unturned in how to bring more young people into the amateur radio service.

It's not about MONEY ....it's about DEMOGRAPHICS.

Most older hams are shocked when they discover how few young hams there are. It is convenient to blame it on the internet, smart phones, and video games, but the clear trend (of fewer young people) happened over 40 years ago--before any of that applied. It never recovered and only got worse, statistically,

There is a reason that ALL ham conventions are showcasing 'youth in ham radio'-- everyone is trying to see what works and what can be done to bring them in.

The latest? Carole Perry, WB2MGP will be the banquet speaker at the Nevada State Convention on 1 April in LV...Carole does a marvelous job encouraging and finding inspiring young hams and calling out others who have done the same. Same with Gordo

 

This is great thanks for sharing.

 

You're welcome.

 

Unfortunately mental illness is rampant in our society, of which some is genetic but probably more from brain damage due to substance abuse both legal and illegal.

I often see it on display within the musician hobby/profession. It really is a serious problem in our country now.

As we hamateurs are just a slice under a microscope of what's going on out there nowadays in our culture, we can also hear mental illness on our bands and in our interweb forums.

As the thread really has now devolved into mental illness I myself now really think that the thread should be locked.

 

I think that that's happening all around the globe in varying degrees. At one time Japan had more than one millions licensed hamateurs and I think that I read recently that there are now only approximately 250,000.

I remember when the bands were full of JA's but not so much now.

 

Gary,
Your "entry level" was very clumsy, as pursued through the eyes of snowflakes (Millennials)
Not once was "the premise" of ham radio mentioned.

The purpose of ham radio is to communicate across the airwaves by which
a satisfaction is achieved in an exchange of greeting and other interests.
Not "who has the better re-invented mouse trap"

I'm sorry.... so very sorry.
The entire hobby goes to the wayside simply because "There is a lack of Curiosity"
Our youth are quelled by the high fructose of continuous inernet conflagration.

 

That will never happen, the moderator of this forum is CASHING in BIG TIME from the traffic generated by posts like this one.

 

I must confess that I don't get these video blogs and call-ins...

I've been asked a dozen times to do them and each time I still can't see why. I guess it seems like 'pretend' broacasting to me.

A few years back I was asked to be on a rock and roll/country pod cast (audio only) , where the 'dj's' kept on saying they were 'two scoops of crazy'-- a husband and wife team, back in the 'Myspace' daze. It seems the marriage revolved around a mixing deck. They used NO compression/limiting on their mikes and they sounded like someone had let the air out...tinny and flaccid. They claimed an audience of 2400.

It reminded me of my (100 milliwatt) CB days at age 9; ya know, pretending to be a DJ. Nope. Not goin' there.

I clicked off.

Obviously I like to talk back as much as listen ;-)

I am ok that other people enjoy them though.

 

Let the newbies have more HF options, like a sliver of the SSB on 80, 40, and 20. Remember, more hams are going SK every day. This is not some cranky old men's club, although sometimes it seems so. If we don't inject some new blood into this hobby, there eventually won't be anyone to talk to...

 

I am not trying to change the subject, and take away from the on-going bantering. However, recently, N8RMA asked hams that use Facebook, to participate in a survey about amateur radio. There were 688 respondents. Interesting data, the three biggest perceived threats to amateur radio are in order, Old Operators (curmudgeons), Lack of Interest, and Young Operators (obnoxious/untrained). 38% of the respondents are under age 54, and 11% under age 34. The over 55 crowd, represented the remainder (51%).

The survey results are available on line, if anyone has an interest. https://sway.com/dBedey0zHZEjk0Xt


I've always wondered about retention. As we know, many licenses expire each year without renewal. However, I wanted to gather data based on a group of people, that IMO would likely have more than just a passing interest in Amateur Radio.

Just to satisfy my own curiosity, I wanted to see how many young hams from that group, have kept their license beyond the usual 10 year period. I decided to use the annual scholarship list published in QST, from October 2005, that listed 40 college bound hams. Most of them were in their late teens or a bit older. Surprisingly, the retention rate is pretty good. I did not query all 40, but about 20. I found that nearly all had kept their amateur license, except for one. FWIW, using the QRZ lookup counter for each call, probably is not a very scientific way to gauge activity. Nevertheless, I only noticed a few that had a significant number of queries for their call. Unsure what that says, but it could imply they do keep the license, but activity is sparse, at least on HF.

Jim AB4D

 

Its hard to tell if that is good data, facebook's core demographic is uneducated and low income. I don't know how that data set would have any value, the age of respondents seems a little skewed.