LOL. Getting yelled at might work for some people. I would laugh inside when the Drill Sergeants would yell and scream at us. An intelligent person knew there was no threat from them. Weak people were the ones who responded to yelling, either in a positive way or a negative way. I somehow managed to lead people in peace and war without having to yell at them in anger or for discipline. My soldiers knew that when I said something it had to get done. If I told them they might find themselves in hot water and I would recommend to the commander about UCMJ action, they knew I was serious. That seemed to work better than mindlessly yelling at someone. BTW: my soldiers had the highest GT scores and were pretty intelligent folks. Yelling at them would do squat. I also jumped out of planes for several decades now and have flown as a crewmember and pilot (civ life). I fail to see how having an instructor yelling at someone would be productive. Just my take on things. And as they say YMMV One can be stern, a great teacher without sounding like an idiot that needs to yell and abuse people. Then again, many in society might need that.
Here's a post I put up on NextDoor, a social media site very popular in my area. Headline was "Best Hobby in the World" The most wonderful hobby in the world - Amateur Radio. I rediscovered a hobby that I had as a boy. When I was 15 years old, I volunteered for a merit badge to work in the Veteran's Hospital. They gave me the job of working with a couple of paraplegic vets (Korean War) who were Ham Radio operators, and they had their "ham shack" set up in a vacant room at the hospital. I got to know these vets real well, and even though they could only move one hand, they got to make friends all over the world through their hobby. I picked it up from them and they guided me through the training necessary to get my license. Soon I had my own equipment and radio room in my house, reaching people in over 60 countries at the time. It was a blast. But then girls. cars, and college came, and I lost that interest until just recently picking it up again during the pandemic. I can't even describe how cool this hobby is. Through my little station in our home, I'm able to contact friends all over the world, directly. This has nothing to do with the Internet or with any kind of infrastructure at all. It's my radio, my antenna, and the antenna on the other side of the world that picks up my station. It's a hobby that has a wonderful benefit of helping the community when tragedy strikes or when infrastructure goes down, and we can train for that. Within the one hobby, there are a dozen side-channels that each have the total and complete passion of those who participate in them. There's "Contesting" as one example, where Hams pit themselves and their clubs against other clubs or individual stations around the globe in intense periods of activity to see who scores the most connections. It's fun! There are younger hams who love to practice SOTA, which means "Summits on the Air" and they are out combining radio with hiking. They set up small stations in parks and summits all around the State and then communicate from there. Our national organization sponsors field days, where everyone even the old-timers gets outdoors with their equipment and conducts safety and community exercises and contests. In addition, the hobby has people who are combining radio with digital electronics and communicating through their computers in conjunction with their radios. It's a fascinating spin-off of traditional ham radio, and guaranteed to keep them hopping with all the new computer/radio equipment, software and technology. Some are talking to the Space Station, or bouncing signals off the moon, or relaying their signals through orbiting satellites! In short, this hobby is one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life. If you are potentially interesting in learning about amateur radio and you need a sounding board, message me and I'll help you out. You'll find the community of ham radio operators, men and women as well, to be the most welcoming and friendly crowd of people in the world. Tied together by their passion for a hobby that brings you out of your home, connecting to the globe by the sheer force of radio waves bouncing off the atmosphere. We are having a blast!
Fantastic comment, and you really hit the nail on the head. Your points will be highlighted in a future episode, but it is exactly why, this year, once I became president of YCARS, I immediately formed a WHI committee. WHI is "Wellness, Happiness, and Inclusion." Inclusion is what the committee focuses on most. It's a mindshift from the traditional "ham radio is an old white man's hobby.", but one that's essential to see this hobby survive for the next generation to enjoy.
I asked my son to come to a Ham club, he was 12 at the time. The youngest at the club was 60 (That was myself)! My son (Adam) said, where are all the young kids?...We went again, and actually found one at 16 years old, N5TIP (Samuel), this fellow ended up being Adam's tutor for 1.5 years (Adam attends University, accepted at age 13) ! Adam at 12 years old, took the Tech exam for his Dad (NN2X) and passed. It took about a week...Even less time... There are kids like KD9POK (Becca) and KD9LFZ (Leah) are rising stars in the Ham community. We need many more of them. Leah's father is a youtuber for Ham radio, and this rubbed off on Leah I was interviewed for the President of ARRL, I indicated that I would focus on the "Show and Tell" at private schools. It works! I did this here is the North Dallas area and worked well. This is what show ARRL should focus on...ARRL, should provide a mission to Ham clubs across the USA to do the same... otherwise, the next CQ call we receive will be from our graves NN2X Tom
Sorry to hear, I bet you would have done a bang up job too. Being said though bribery will get you anywhere so a case of Geritol to the board member's and you would have been in like flint.
I've got a problem, now. Too many responses (!! positive) to my post on the site Next Door, which I relayed in my message above. Question for Quin or anyone else . . . Now that I've got a bunch of people who are interested and asking for help in getting started, where do I take it? I can't refer them to my local ARC, because as I mentioned here, I had ZERO positive feelings about that. It might be OK later, if I want to join the old boys club. But for now, I've got three or four (guys, no gals) people a lot like me who need help. Should I bring them together? I was thinking of taking my IC-705 to the local park and setting up on a table, inviting them over for a bit of a chat about ham radio. Could show them CW, but I don't want to scare them with code. Can show them 2 meter local activity, which is a lot of fun in my area, and some 17 or 20 meter SSB from the park bench. Bring some magazines and books to lend out . . . Thoughts??
Recognizing most people who say they're interested won't show up when something actually happens, you'll probably be ok. Agree on leaving out the code as that's more of a specialist niche and you want to introduce them to topics they're more natively familiar with. Which mode and band you pick is more dependent on what is a active around you. Maybe 2m FM (repeater and simplex) and 20m SSB to give them two very different avenues (and explain the fundamental differences in non-technical, jargon-free language). If you're into POTA, doing an activation would generate a lot of activity quickly so you can show people activity. Going out cold might not garner as much. Some magazines and books to lend would be good, but leave the deep technical tomes at home. Bring stuff with a focus on ham-based activities, articles about getting started, etc. Make it fun and interesting, deemphasize the deeply technical and difficult stuff for now, they'll be more open to that after they're hooked on the fun stuff. Chris
Great advice Chris. I hope they show up . . . I'll see about the POTA idea, and particularly if there's a drive up and park scenario somewhere in there. I don't want to get too far up a mountainside, etc. It would be great to do an activation and get a lot of attention. I fear getting on some band, doing a CQ and getting nothing back in return, with faces looking at me wondering what's going on and where all the excitement is? Dave
That's why I suggested POTA. Even using a 10w portable transceiver and a simple wire antenna, once I self-spot for POTA, I start getting contacts and end up getting 15+ in about 10 minutes. I've had people calling me before I can even get organized and calling CQ myself. If you're not registered as an activator, head over to Parks on the Air | POTA | Parks program for amateur radio, sign up, then go do a dry run on your own so you're aware of the process and workflow before doing it for an audience. Chris
Thanks for the kind words! (N1IPU) /Mark! I was surely ready to be the ARRL President, but I don't know if I would last that long...I am truly would have stream line the process, and focus nearly 100% of my time growing the Ham population, (Targeting young kids, through Ham Clubs / Private schools). That would had been fun (I like the show and tell aspect...) When I did this last time, I included math, geography, history and of course Ham Radio.We would go to the Private School, and asked the kids where they wanted to speak to, (Which country /Let say Saudi Arabia), From there we would start off with the VOACAP software, to illustrate what frequency and what time a day we could connect (This would also indicate what mode to use)...Then from there, we did the math to design an antenna, I used a 2 element Yagi ( Hex Beam), using 400 Watts, for the mode of SSB...The kids loved it...Actually the parents, got involved..Of course I would speak with Hams in Saudi Arabia (Prior to the test). When the actual QSO occurred the kids loved it... (These kids ranged from 5 years old to 13 years old). Also did this with VK3MO (Ian) in Australia, that was very cool! You could not miss with his 5/5/5/5/5 Mono Bander... Forget public schools it truly to restrictive, I tried like heck! The private schools were eager, and the parents were as well. Cheers / NN2X Tom
