Welcoming Young Hams to the Hobby.

[n2ize]

How are we supposed to be welcomning new hams into the hobby if a young 12 year old ham can spend 1/2 hour calling in to a prominent repeater and not get acknoledged by anyone listening ?

Such was the case a couple nights ago. I was on the phone and had my radio tuned to a rather popular, prominent, local repeater at prime time. In the backgound I heard a young voice calling in to the repeater over and over again yet not one station acknowleged him. Yeah, i know, it could be that no licensed ham was listening at the time. But somehow, I highly doubt it. Finally after about a half hour I get off the phone and 5 minutes later I again hear the youngster call in. I grab my radio and acknowledge him. Turns out he's 12, recently licensed and he had some questions about VHF/UHF antennas. I answeed them the best I could and finally some other ham chimed in with some suggestions of some specific brands of antennas.

Again, last night the same thing happened. I hears the same young ham calling in with no acknowledgement until I grabbed my radio and acknowledged him. This time we talked about Hf antennas, power levels on HF, antenna tuners and hf stuff. Nobody else joined our QSO. I hope my suggestions were helpful to this youngster. Both times I welcomed him to the hobby and tried to give him encouragement.

Question I have is, we hear the mantra over and over that "we must bring new blood into the hobby". Great idea..,. But how is that going to happen if hams don't acknowledge young hams when they come on the radio ? What kind of encouragement is a young ham going to receive if he can call in on a popular local repeater at prime time and get no response ? I can't be out there all the time. Nor is my advice all the advice this youngster needs. He needs the support and advice of the amateur community to lend their knowledge and expertise.

I generally try and acknowledge young people and try and make them feel welcome as well as try and give them the best technical advice I can, I hope more hams out there do the same.

[PA5COR]

I personally trained 50 kids/people into their license now, mostly at my costs and time, and in that period of learning, soldering a project, and spend 10 hours here on the radio 160 - 70 cm is part of the training, so they already made a bundle of contacts under my supervision, mostly worldwide.
Even a Novice license here is good for parts of 40/20/and the whole 10 meter band, and 2/70 full.
Added benefit, they actually must recognise components, learn to solder and do some fault searching if the project does not work.
And have "hands on" experience in antena's tuners radio's etc.

[n2ize]

I personally trained 50 kids/people into their license now, mostly at my costs and time, and in that period of learning, soldering a project, and spend 10 hours here on the radio 160 - 70 cm is part of the training, so they already made a bundle of contacts under my supervision, mostly worldwide.
Even a Novice license here is good for parts of 40/20/and the whole 10 meter band, and 2/70 full.
Added benefit, they actually must recognise components, learn to solder and do some fault searching if the project does not work.
And have "hands on" experience in antena's tuners radio's etc.

That is very nice to hear. The only way to get new people into this hobby is by helping them to develop the skills and curiosity to experiment. I hope more amateur ops are following your path and reaching out and helping new radio operators.

[W4GPL]

I started out at age 13 -- the vast majority of the older guys in the club & on the air were very welcoming. All you can do is be as supportive as possible in your own way, and remind us from time to time that we should to the same.

[PA5COR]

Having the new hams making qso's for 10 hours minimum during the lessons frees them of being "scared "of the microphone/digital signals. and get a short CW intro.
Most of our VERON club also get the new calls, and will do their best to take them in.
For the rest it's to them ;)

[kd8dey]

Typically, A new ham after he/she makes themselves known they are automatically accused of being the one ker-chunking the repeater for the past 6 months regardless of the fact that they have only had their license/first radio for a few days. Happened to me.

I rarely get on except to listen to the antics on 11m, since one of the few Hams I did talk to passed away while I was in a nursing home. The other one moved and the old friend that talked me into getting my ticket got bummed out that he couldn't reach me other than by repeater AND Their local Nazi didn't like the Idea that we were not members talking on it when they have 3 repeaters and that particular repeater was rarely used.

Been thinking about letting my ticket lapse, selling out and using the money for lab equipment.

[n2ize]

Typically, A new ham after he/she makes themselves known they are automatically accused of being the one ker-chunking the repeater for the past 6 months regardless of the fact that they have only had their license/first radio for a few days. Happened to me.

I rarely get on except to listen to the antics on 11m, since one of the few Hams I did talk to passed away while I was in a nursing home. The other one moved and the old friend that talked me into getting my ticket got bummed out that he couldn't reach me other than by repeater AND Their local Nazi didn't like the Idea that we were not members talking on it when they have 3 repeaters and that particular repeater was rarely used.

Been thinking about letting my ticket lapse, selling out and using the money for lab equipment.

I generally do more listening than talking, particularly when it comes to VHF and repeaters. I find it best not to become too popular out there for some of the same reasons you mention above.

[suddenseer]

Typically, A new ham after he/she makes themselves known they are automatically accused of being the one ker-chunking the repeater for the past 6 months regardless of the fact that they have only had their license/first radio for a few days. Happened to me.

I rarely get on except to listen to the antics on 11m, since one of the few Hams I did talk to passed away while I was in a nursing home. The other one moved and the old friend that talked me into getting my ticket got bummed out that he couldn't reach me other than by repeater AND Their local Nazi didn't like the Idea that we were not members talking on it when they have 3 repeaters and that particular repeater was rarely used.

Been thinking about letting my ticket lapse, selling out and using the money for lab equipment.

The last time i used a 2m repeater was when my friend died back in 2001. They used to be very busy in the Dayton area, lots of fun. I need a new mic for my 241 Kenwood, I could probably hit you simplex. 147.585 was where most of us lone wolf misfits would hang out. Often, we would push the envelope. Many of the stuffed shirt repeater control ops would monitor simplex to find out if they were being talked about, yes they were.

[n3aiu]

Keep newcomers away from repeaters. Cell phones work better and you don't have to put up with jerks.

On VHF, get them interested in Es/tropo on 6 and 2. When they upgrade, get them involved with DX and/or PSK and/or ... . Nothing more thrilling than using the ionosphere instead of cell towers. There's also antenna/electronics/software projects.

[n2ize]

Keep newcomers away from repeaters. Cell phones work better and you don't have to put up with jerks.

Repeaters are probably the WORST way you can introduce a new comer to this hobby. Repeaters are still way too cliquish and certain people will only acknowledge persons that they know. Most of the time if you put your call letters over a repeater you won't get a response. Many repeater clubs don;t like it if you use their repeater and you're not a dues paying club member despite the fact that they advertise their repeater as "open".

On VHF, get them interested in Es/tropo on 6 and 2. When they upgrade, get them involved with DX and/or PSK and/or ... . Nothing more thrilling than using the ionosphere instead of cell towers. There's also antenna/electronics/software projects.

Agreed. These are much better areas of focus. If I were to comprise a list of activities for a newcomer to get involved with, repeater usage would be at the bottom of the list. It's just not a good starter point for a noob.