The ARRL recently reported on an IARU meeting held in late September. Here’s an excerpt:
Participants at the 45th meeting of the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) Administrative Council (AC) in late September discussed the organization’s role in advancing amateur radio going forward. The IARU released a summary record of the meeting this week. IARU President Tim Ellam, VE6SH/G4HUA, who chaired the AC meeting in Lima, Peru, observed that the IARU and amateur radio are reaching what he called “an inflection point.” He asserted that amateur radio is changing, but the IARU and its member-societies are not.
Ellam’s remarks prefaced a wide-ranging discussion of the challenges to be overcome if the IARU and amateur radio itself are to remain relevant. After several hours of discussion, AC participants agreed on four top-level headings to identify the challenges that must be faced:
- What is amateur radio?
- The roles of IARU and its member-societies
- Recruitment into amateur radio
- IARU finances
The AC also agreed that it is essential to involve younger people from outside the Council in determining how to address these challenges, and the three IARU regions were asked to identify individuals who “could take ownership of these topics.”
I think that perhaps Ellam hit the nail on the head when he asserts that “amateur radio is changing, but the IARU and its member-societies are not.” The problem, of course is that to work your way up into the leadership of organizations like the ARRL and the IARU, you generally need to have been around a long time and done some noteworthy things for amateur radio. Unfortunately, people who have been successful at something tend to want to promulgate the things that they know and have been successful at, and those things aren’t necessarily the best things for the organization going forward.
As I’ve mentioned before, I am a member of the Rotary Club as well as an amateur radio operator, and I’m always comparing the worlds of Rotary and amateur radio. In many ways, Rotary suffers from the same problem. Rotary leaders are long-time Rotarians, and while they certainly have Rotary’s best interests at heart, I’m not sure that they have the vision needed to propel the organization into the future.
I’m not sure what the best approach is to our common dilemma. Recruiting younger people is always brought forward as a solution, and while this is a step in the right direction, I’m not sure that younger people have enough perspective, and they certainly can’t tackle this on their own. Another issue is having the time and money needed to be able to spend the time working on ham radio or Rotary. IARU and Rotary leaders are volunteers who do this out of love for amateur radio and Rotary.
I’d be interested in hearing what you all have to think about this. Sometimes, I think I’m making too big a deal out of things like this, but if we want amateur radio and Rotary to enjoy a prosperous future, then we really do need to work on these issues. How do we proceed?
Sterling N0SSC says
I’m also really glad Tim brought this up (and that ARRL news editor Rick Lindquist WW1ME penned the headline). I sent the Inflection Point WG an email offering up some ideas and my volunteer services, and it was well received. I think they’re chewing on it for a bit.
First of all, I defined youth as just about anyone under the average age of ham radio operators – a number we definitely need to figure out, but N8RMA’s survey estimates it between 50 and 60 years of age, even for a web-distributed online survey. In other words, not just children, pre-teens, teens, and young adults, but 20, 30, and 40 somethings too.
I called out some pitfalls and accomplishments of the IARU and other leagues like ARRL and RSGB, as well as local organizations and elmers.
Pitfalls such as a lack of youth representation and organization, youth representation by the not-so-young, loss of programs like the ARRL’s Youth Editor position (yes, I’m still salty), calling out the focus-on-youth disagreement that you actually mentioned*, and a failure to launch or perhaps a glaring understatement of some programs. For example IARU Region 2 appointed a Youth Coach – Gustavo de Faria Franco, PT2ADM – in 2017 “with the responsibility to find R2 Youth Coordinator candidates and a team of other youngster [sic] that could develop a new generation of radio amateurs in the region.” [https://www.iaru-r2.org/iaru-r2-executive-committee-meeting/] but after two years there’s been no updates from the Executive Committee.
And accomplishments such as YOTA filling in those missing youth representation roles (at least in IARU region 1), ARRL’s Learning Institute, and the fact that organizations are actively concerned and are attempting to address the problem at hand. However it seems like youth organizations are coming from the ground up, rather than the top down – maybe that’s the right way to do it? Who knows. We’ll certainly see with YARC [https://yarc.world] and YOTA in Region 2 [https://yotaregion2.org].
I hope the WG has good findings and that they reach out to the young movers and shakers in amateur radio for their insights.
At the very least, my suggestion to amateur radio organizations globally is to keep an open mind. Specifically, talk to some young people who enjoy the hobby to get insight into what makes them interested with the hobby as well as other interests; don’t assume that just because kids these days like computers that they’ll fall in love with digital modes; realize experiences in ham radio are unbounded – DXing, contesting, satellites, SDRs, etc are all small facets that each on their own could strike an interest in a potential newcomer, so be prepared with a broad knowledge to help new hams and radio hobbyists get their footing; young people want to socialize with people closer to their age, so try attracting groups of young people (like YDXA, YOTA, YACHT, YARC) or bring demonstrations to the public where young people might be (like farmers markets, festivals, city parks and whatnot);
*You said “Recruiting younger people is always brought forward as a solution, and while this is a step in the right direction, I’m not sure that younger people have enough perspective, and they certainly can’t tackle this on their own…” ARRL CEO Howard Michel also addresses the problem, but on the flipside wants to ensure the ARRL doesn’t get too entrenched in focusing on one demographic at risk of abandoning the old guard. This is certainly a good characteristic to have in a large scale organization, but I feel it’s turning a blind eye to (arguably) one of ham radio’s most challenging problems. [http://www.arrl.org/news/view/new-ceo-wants-arrl-to-serve-all-ages-and-amateur-radio-interests]
I tend to agree with you and Howard – young people are busy and ham radio might be a small potato in their life. But in lieu of youth leadership in amateur radio, I believe an effort needs to be made to include the viewpoints of young people well entrenched in the hobby. I only *tend* to agree, because one exclusion to young people tackling the problem on their own is YARC, a totally grassroots organization that’s somehow rustled up over 1,200 young hams from around the world on Discord, as well as YOTA in Region 1, when it formed several years ago.
KN4YYJ says
I think it’s less about recruiting a lot of young people to get them into leadership, and more about the current leadership being more open to change and adapting to the new ways the world works. Telling new hams some good starting points based on experience is all well and good, but from what I’ve heard/seen, older hams are resistant to changes or different ways of doing things that they’ve been accustomed to. The old and young need to work together, as neither side holds the full responsibility of keeping ham radio alive.
It’s certainly a dilemma.
Chuck Nakamura says
Ham radio should become an application for new hobbies or interests of the generation. Such ideas are prone to come from outside of ham population. In this scope, how about allowing amateur radio without an exam for a limited time period , so that outsiders can try and possibly come up with new idea to utilize amateur radio? (Of course there would have to be flexible thinking about it.. As for the purpose of ham i tbink an oath would be enough rather than testing on am exam)
Gareth says
Hi Dan
I used to be a member of Lions International, so I recognise your comparison with Rotary. However, there is one big difference, and I think it makes the solution easier.
Rotary/Lions et al are top-down, governance-rich organisations. Initiatives come from the top. Amateur Radio is very much bottom-up.
Nobody is forced to join a national (or even local) society. Beyond adherence to the licence, there is very little regulation and a great deal of freedom to innovate, organise and collaborate. This is the source of the solution.
Don’t look to national organisations for solutions: look to the informal groups of amateurs that already exist, find those that are successfully adapting to the changing world, and learn from them. Over here in the UK, I’d start with Essex Ham https://www.essexham.co.uk/ , a “virtual” radio club. Another would be the various maker-focused groups.
73, Gareth – M5KVK
Dave New, N8SBE says
I was drawn to the QRP crowd. Not necessarily because I’m a really gung-ho low-power operator, but because that is where I see the most innovation and active participation. I started building kits and experimenting on my bench again for the first time in decades, due to the QRP crowd.
Look at what folks like QRPlabs is doing. Check out his balloon project pages there, to see some really cool balloon flights, like a party balloon that circumvented the globe 8 times, carrying a 30M WSPR radio with GPS for tracking.
There are a lot of folks building and operating SDR radios. TAPR is putting together an SDR radio for use in the HAMSci projects.
Look at all the DMR operating going on (TAC 310 was so popular with everyone’s hotspots, the Brandmeister folks had to limit idle connect time), and the inexpensive radios (about $150) that get you in that game.
Local repeater clubs put up a lot of Fusion repeaters, replacing their FM-only equipment. A number of club members have purchased new Fusion/FM radios to experiment with the mode.
All of these have happened without (or in spite of, depending on your viewpoint) any assistance from a national association for amateur radio.