Last fall, under the aegis of Ham Radio Village, I was awarded a grant to take my one-day Tech class on the road. Ham Radio Village believes that more people in technical fields should have amateur radio licenses and that amateur radio is underrepresented in the hacker, STEM/STEAM, and maker communities. Currently, there is little outreach to these communities about the benefits of amateur radio in their fields.
Enter the “ham radio evangelist.” In October of 2o23, we applied for and were awarded an $18,000 grant to reach out beyond the boundaries of traditional amateur radio communities, including scientific, engineering, hacker, maker, and STEM/STEAM focused conferences where attendees might have an interest in amateur radio (e.g., DEFCON, GRCon, Maker Faire, IEEE Communications Conference).
This grant provides funding to both educate these communities about amateur radio and to streamline the process of obtaining an amateur radio license. If accepted, HRV will give a talk about amateur radio, teach a one-day Technician Class license course, and offer a Volunteer Examiner test session at an event. These activities will provide these new hams with a lifelong hobby that aligns with their professional and technical interests. And, it will also enable these new hams to bring their experiences and ideas to amateur radio, thereby advancing the hobby.
HOPE couldn’t have gone any better
HOPE XV was the first event at which we evangelized ham radio. In my mind, it couldn’t have gone any better.
On Friday, I gave a talk entitled “Ham Radio for Hackers.” (Click here to see the slides.) I wandered in about 10 minutes before the talk was to start at 1:00 pm. There were already so many people there that I thought I was in the wrong room.
Adding to my confusion, was the fact that the slide announcing the previous talk was still up on the screen. I turned around and started heading out, but caught myself before I left the room. This had to be the place, and indeed it was.
In the talk, I explained some of the basics of amateur radio, discussed some of the projects that radio amateurs are currently hacking on, and then how to get a hacking, errrr ham radio license. I probably could have gone into a little more depth on some of the projects, but in general, I think that the talk was very well-received.
Tech class yields 25 new hams
On Saturday, I held my one-day Tech class. I was concerned that attendance would be poor because:
- They scheduled the class on Saturday, and there were lots of other interesting talks being held that day.
- They scheduled the class to start at 10:30 am, which could have thrown off my timing.
As it turned out, the class went really well. The students asked lots of questions—which caused the class to run about an hour longer than usual—but they were all good questions. 25 hackers passed the test and got their licenses. There were some failures, but it’s unclear whether those people were in the class or not. We invited anyone to show up at 5:00 pm and take the test, whether they were in the class or not. I’m going to claim that 100% of the students passed the test.
I can say that all those who passed the test were very excited that they did. Many of them came up to me after the class and thanked me. I can also say that this group was much younger than normal. I’m guessing that there were only two students over the age of 50. There was a good number of women, too. I counted at least six women.
I really want to thank the VE team. Without them, this couldn’t have happened. They were:
- Seth, N2SPG
- Nicole, AD2IM
- Ed, N2XDD
- Grant, W4KEK
- Vlad, AF7QV
A great start
I think that this is a great start to the ham radio evangelist program. Not only did we license 25 new hams, they all seem very interested in the hobby.
I also talked to a lot of different people about the program. One fellow, a young guy working with the Philadelphia Maker Faire, invited me to contact him about doing a class next spring.
So, onward and upward! I think the hackers at HOPE are just the kind of people we want to get into the hobby. They’re young and interested in hacking ham radio. It will be fun to see what they can do.
I think one thing some older hams have forgotten is that they didn’t get into ham radio to win contests, or to make contacts, or to talk across the world. They got in because they saw an article about a one-tube radio or a Tuna Tin 2 and decided to try building it. Only after they got exposed did they start seeing what else they could do.
Today’s hackers/makers are the same: they want to play around, build something – maybe hardware, maybe software – and see where that takes them.
I was recently inspired by the QSO Today podcast (#507, K5TEC). Building something cool is what young people wanted to do in the 1960s, and it’s what they want today. We shouldn’t be trying to get them to do what we do, we should be showing them the tools and standing back!
That’s the future of ham radio – everything else comes after that.
Great point, Andrew!
Sound like a good bunch you had for the class, Dan. Good work!
So are hackers the future of amateur radio? Yes, I believe that hacking will be a big part of it. Hacking seems to be especially a way to cultivate younger hams. Will have to think on how to work this locally.
Let me know what you come up with, Rob.
Given the lack of RF engineers (indeed electronic engineers in general), the recent HAM RADIO Friedrichshafen, included a job fair where 4 major technology firms were looking for suitable people to train to fill the large number of open positions that they (and other companies) have.
Their train of thought was that those in the Amateur Radio hobby already have many of the needed skills and also are able to be trained further in technical skills. Radio hams are considered people who are prepared to get their hands dirty and fix problems, which, unfortunately the average school or university leaver is not these days.
So this is “outreach” into Ham Radio which can also be used as a way to bring more people into the hobby – “get ham radio technical skills and stand a better chance of landing your dream job over applicants who are not radio hams”.
73 Ed DD5LP.
I wonder if the Dayton folks have thought of this. Not only is it good for the companies, it could be a draw for the event.
I got interested in radio at about 8 years old. I was fascinated by the fact that I could listen to an AM broadcast station (KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles) 35 miles away using a crystal radio and a long-wire antenna. It wasn’t the programming, it was the tech. 55 years later, I didn’t get my ham license to “chew the rag”. Things like WinLink, EchoLink, and packet radio are what keep me going!
well, make peace a not new progressive stealth scientology/nazi war; all data modes are the same; we ALL live on this single usable planet; 73!
Hi, you know, my dad (franta, ok1akj) was entire life on HF/CW. I was as a kid more fascinated by computers, but learned a lot also from his QST set to him by friends. When he passed away, after few years, I connected at least few airspy mini (+ spyverter) to his antennas, hosted on small netbook as a server and had this streamed over wifi downstairs to my desktop computer with SDRSharp. Tried to play with it for a while (I had young license only, not followed much my dad’s hobby…). As I dont talk much, the more I listen, One thing I heard on HF, even far before 2022-02, somewhere around 7MHz was also FAT UA pirate screaming his NAZI bs. And, honestly, sadly, it seems that most of ham community here is forced to war just in NAZI boots, to “destroy the red/yellow enemy”. This is out of my humanity values, which I learned from my dad. So I am at war against new stealth progressive scientology/nazi, at least since 2018 (investigated ALL relations during last 10 years, deeply). Excuse me.
Petr
This post got referenced on Hackaday – https://hackaday.com/2024/07/18/are-hackers-the-future-of-amateur-radio/
Will also be featured in this week’s Zero Retries newsletter – https://www.zeroretries.org/p/zero-retries-0161.
“i taught some people about ham radio this one time”
Ok…. great article, now do the one where you explain where and how hacking intersects with ham radio, some project examples, and some frequency basics.
I want that article please.
Cheers
Did you see the slides to my talk? These are projects that you can start hacking on. One thing that I left out are all the 3D-printed parts and accessories that hams are creating for ham radio projects.
Great article and result, Dan.
Upon a lot of reflection from now over 510 QSO Today Podcast interview discussions, it occurs to me that amateur radio was a gateway to technical carreers for many of us as kids. The idea that every kid should go to college is now a demonstrated failure with a saturation of college graduates to industry that can’t find work.
Can we use amateur radio as a first step towards retargeting youth towards technical carreers such as technicians in all industries? Can we speak to these new licensees about opportunities in trade schools, community colleges, and industry provided education? Can we make this advice part of our amateur radio culture to encourage our young people to replace the armies of retiring technical types that keep the lights burning in our cities and towns?