Moving on to my next challenge

Wednesday, May 31, 2023, was my last day as an employee of Amateur Radio Digital Communications, the private foundation that’s “empowering the future of amateur radio and digital communication.” It was a great job, but in the end, it was a job, and now it’s time to do something different. I wouldn’t quite call it “retirement,” but it’s pretty close.

Here’s the way I put it in the final ARDC newsletter that I produced for them:

Note from Dan, KB6NU

I first made contact with ARDC by attending the February 2021 community meeting. At that meeting, Rosy KJ7RYV, our Executive Director, mentioned that one of the problems that they were having was that ARDC was not well-known yet in the amateur radio community, and as a result, they weren’t getting as many grant applications as they needed.

When I heard that, it occurred to me that with my writing and PR skills and my ham radio contacts, I could do just what ARDC needed to be done. I contacted Rosy, told her that she needed to hire me, and, to make a long story short, I became ARDC employee #3 in June 2021.

Now, nearly two years later, many more people know who we are, major amateur radio publications have published our articles and press releases, and we have appeared on many amateur radio podcasts and streaming video shows. And, we now receive many more grant applications than we can fund. I believe that I can claim success.

That being the case, now is the time for me to take up my next challenge. On May 31, I will be leaving ARDC.

What my next challenge will be I’m not sure yet, but I have plenty of projects to keep me busy:

• I plan to continue publishing my “No Nonsense” license study guides and have a couple of ideas for new books as well.
• I hope to teach more ham radio classes.
• I’m going to continue to address the issues facing amateur radio on my blog at KB6NU.com, and I may start a podcast to reach even more people.
• I’m exploring the possibility of starting an amateur radio business, or forming a partnership with an existing business, to produce some cool, new amateur radio products.

Heck, now that I’ll have more free time, I may even finally get around to learning how to use that antenna-modeling software I downloaded a couple years ago.

I’ve always said that my mission is to help more people have more fun with amateur radio. No matter what my next challenge will be, you can be sure that is what I’m going to do.

73,
 Dan KB6NU

Like I say, I have plenty to keep me busy in “retirement,” but I’m always open to suggestions. Let me know what you think.