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By Brian Mileshosky, N5ZGT
Contributing Editor
Attention college Amateur Radio operators! The Seventh Annual Collegiate Amateur Radio Club Championship is just around the corner, and you are encouraged to participate!
The Collegiate Championship is an exciting contest geared toward Amateur Radio operators who are college students. The event runs concurrently with the ARRL November Sweepstakes. Its purpose--according to the Collegiate Championship Web site--is "to encourage college and university stations in all ARRL and RAC sections to participate in the ARRL November Sweepstakes, compete against other college and university radio clubs, and improve on-campus radio stations."
As does the ARRL November Sweeps, the CW portion of this contest takes place on November 4-6, 2000; the phone portion takes place on November 18-20, 2000. Both start Saturday at 2100 UTC and end Monday at 0300 UTC. Information about this unique contest can be found on the World Wide Web.
Another reason for this contest is to promote Amateur Radio at colleges and universities and to promote ham radio clubs and on-site ham stations on college campuses. Participation is limited to clubs at institutions of higher learning (ie, beyond the high-school level), so get your college or university club into the action. Have fun, and good luck!
Jamboree On The Air 2000 a Hit!
If you didn't get a chance to participate in this year's Jamboree On the Air, you certainly missed out on a lot of fun!
The purpose of JOTA is twofold: Promote Amateur Radio to the youth (particularly in Scouting, but those not involved in Scouting are welcome) and have a weekend full of fun on the air in a worldwide ham activity that is not a contest.
This year's JOTA took place on October 21-22, and some 400,000 Scouts, Scouters (these are adults who volunteer their time in Scouting) and other youths were expected to hit the bands and experience Amateur Radio first-hand! I have been in contact with a few groups in the United States who participated in JOTA and am featuring their experiences.
JOTA--Pacificon Style!
Amateurs at Pacificon 2000, the annual ARRL Pacific Division Meeting and Convention in Concord, California, hosted a great JOTA effort for Bay Area Scouts and Scouters. Forty Scouts, including several Girl Scouts and Brownies, had their chance to experience ham radio at the on-site Pacificon special event station. The control operators of the station were Mike Greevich, KB6USJ, and Jim Berry, KE6IZP, who is an Assistant Scoutmaster of Troop 36 based in Danville, California. These two gentlemen have operated the Pacificon special events station for Jamboree On The Air each year since 1996.
The Scouts and Scouters came from 27 different packs and troops in the Bay Area. Throughout the weekend they made 56 contacts, ranging from the Yukon Territory to the southern tip of Florida throughout 29 states, three provinces, and even Slovenia! Jim reported that some of the QSOs ran for an hour or more. Lots of good Scout rag chewing! Most of their contacts were on 10 meters, with some on 20. Not bad for 100 W from Northern California with a fixed beam.
Jim wishes to thank the folks who organized and ran Pacificon for including them in their annual event, Ham Radio Outlet for the use of an Alinco DX-77EQ HF transceiver, and Tom Schiller, N6BT, of Force 12 for the use of his trailer-mounted tower and five-band beam. "Without their ongoing support over the past years, we wouldn't have been able to make this opportunity so accessible to our Scouts," Jim says. It sounds like they had a great time!
Many groups hold JOTA at Scout camps, but this was different because it was held at one of the largest Amateur Radio gatherings in the nation. Great job, Jim and Mike!
JOTA-OC--Where Anything is Bound to Happen!
Gordon West, WB6NOA, does JOTA with a couple of young Cub Scouts. |
Mel Goldberg, N6MEL, reports that JOTA-Orange County (hence the JOTA-OC) brought more than 875 Scouts together with 18 area RACES and ARES teams and radio clubs. The internationally known Gordon West, WB6NOA, was there to assist with this extremely large effort, and ARRL Amateur Radio Direction Finding Coordinator Joe Moell, K0OV, provided transmitter hunts throughout the day. There was even a VE session especially for kids!
To give you an idea of just how large this JOTA effort was, there were four HF stations on the air, slow-scan television (SSTV) on HF and VHF, amateur television (ATV), and even a 13-GHz commercial satellite station provided by the California Department of Emergency Services. The Scouts made more than 1300 QSOs and chatted with participants in 13 countries.
JOTA in Orange County, California, was a bit more exciting than intended when the police bomb squad was called in to check a suspicious parcel. The police used this robot device to check out the package. |
But, as Mel explains, "The day really started with a bang when a suspicious briefcase was found at the site that required the Orange County bomb squad along with a bomb robot. Fortunately it was just full of paper. But [it] required complete radio silence for the first 2 hours--very exciting for the Scouts!"
In all, JOTA-OC was a great success! Mel is an Assistant Scoutmaster of Troop 319, and an avid promoter of Scouting and Amateur Radio through ScoutRadio--a "good turn project" of the grassroots "ScoutElmers," promoting Amateur Radio worldwide at the local, regional and national level. (I'll have more to say about ScoutRadio in my next column!)
Brian says: "JOTA Should be Every Day!"
I'm serious. What kind of an impact do you think we, as hams would have on youth if we were to promote Amateur Radio to them as we did during JOTA 2000--but every single day of the year? How many young hams do you think would enter our hobby? What good do you think this would have for Amateur Radio?
It's somewhat alarming that the average age of Amateur Radio operators, at least in the United States, is in the 50s. Sure, times have changed from the era when ham radio was at the forefront of wireless technology and piqued the interest of a lot more youth. In today's world, a lot of factors compete with Amateur Radio, such as the Internet, the recently released Sony Play Station 2, and what I call the "dangerous chemicals"--gasoline and perfume. I know, because I've been there, and still am.
The California Department of Emergency Services 13-GHz satellite station was on hand at the Orange County JOTA site. It permitted the site to have e-mail capability. [Photos courtesy of Mel Goldberg, N6MEL/Orange County JOTA] |
This is why I am very serious about having JOTA every day. We as hams should be constantly promoting the hobby we love to young people of all ages. The Amateur Radio clubs we belong to should be constantly Elmering groups of young people and fostering their interest in ham radio. We should be constantly showing them what a unique, fun, beneficial and useful hobby we are happy to be a part of, then do whatever it takes for them to join us.
There are many ways of going about this, but the first step is doing your best to do your part (either as an individual or club), because no matter how you look at Amateur Radio, its ultimate future happens to be the same reason why Jamboree On The Air takes place every October--the youth. How will you do your part for ham radio?
Till Next Time
That's all for this edition! As always, feel free to pass on your ideas for Youth@Hamradio.Fun topics! I'm still interested in hearing about your JOTA experiences or your efforts in the Collegiate Championship or ARRL November Sweepstakes. Pass on new and fun ways to promote ham radio to the youth or tell me about your active Amateur Radio youth club. I'm interested!
E-mail questions and comments to me at n5zgt@arrl.net, or visit my Amateur Radio Web site.
Editor's note: Brian Mileshosky, N5ZGT, hails from Albuquerque, New Mexico. A 20-year-old senior in electrical engineering at the University of New Mexico, Brian was the 1999 ARRL Hiram Percy Maxim Award winner. He was first licensed in 1992 at age 12, hold a General license and now is studying for his Amateur Extra ticket. "I love Amateur Radio, and wish I could have gotten into the hobby sooner," he says. Brian enjoys many of the activities afforded by Amateur Radio, including CW, QRP CW, transmitter hunting, satellite operation, some digital modes, and, of course, just speaking into the microphone. Brian authored the Youth Forum column for Worldradio magazine for three years. He's an active brother of the Kappa Sigma fraternity. Brian welcomes visitors to his Web site.
