IN-Newsletter
Vol. 28, No. 9
March 2, 2005
Media & Public Relations
Over 60 copies of the new video PSA went out quickly and were placed
with broadcast and cable stations. The audio PSA continues to be placed
and I receive regular reports from around the country from people who
have heard it. The "Swiss Army Knife" CD of ready resources for PIOs
has been completed and duplicated for distribution. It is intended
primarily for new PIOs but has been found to be a major help to many.
Materials have been sent for the NAB convention booth in Las Vegas. I
am gathering highlights of 2004 from departments for the annual report.
The PR committee is actively planning several exciting opportunities for
Dayton and there are a couple new initiatives in the works including
"Take your HT to Work Day," linking national food distribution centers
with VOAD through ham radio, and having hams be instrumental in testing
a new fuel cell concept for EmComm work.
Production/Editorial
Rick Lindquist reports The ARRL Letter, Vol. 24, No. 08, circulated to
65,527 members February 25. Rick prepared/edited stories on the
introduction of the Amateur Radio Spectrum Protection Act for 2005 (HR
691) in the 109th Congress, a consent decree between a manufacturer and
the FCC about a Part 15 interference case (ARRL Lab was involved), the
Rockland, Maine, ARISS school group contact, the 2005 Amateur Radio
hurricane conference and SM elections, plus several news briefs and
announcements. Rick voiced, edited and produced ARRL Audio News for
February 25.
Sales & Marketing
April QST left for press with display advertising exceeding projections
by $6,000 and will include ads from several new and returning
advertisers: Emcomm West; Far Circuits; Hamtest Online; W2DRZ EME and
Timewave Technology. In addition, a hamfest announcement ad was
procured from the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society. Ten-Tec continued
their expanded advertising by placing 1 1/2 pages and LDG Electronics
increased their ad to a full page, 4-color advertisement.
Monthly publication stock-out estimations were provided to the
Production Department.
An e-mail advertising solicitation for the May 2005 Dayton Theme
Pull-out was followed by a 4-color (printed in-house) mailing piece.
Several pages of the pull-out have been filled already and we are
pleased to note that several advertisers in this venue are new QST
advertisers.
Membership Services
Awards Branch
WAS Certs. (300 QSLs F/C) 6
WAS Certs. (150 QSLs ES/C) 3
WAS Ends. (150 QSLs F/C) 3
5BWAS Awards (500 QSLs F/C) 2
5BWAS Award (250 QSLs ES/C) 1
WAC QSL Cards Checked 84
A-1 Op. Noms. 2
Replacement Award 1
VUCC Initial Apps. 1
Grids 141
VUCC End. Apps. 4
Grids 184
LTMA Inquiries 1
Awards Mailed 13
Also, worked on some LTMA projects (on-going). Processing Status:
Current or up to three weeks.
For the coming week-Basic WAS awards for February, WAS QSL card
checking, U.S. WAC awards, Extra Class certificates, and mail out all
awards processed this week.
Contest Branch
Data entry for the 2005 RTTY Roundup, 2005 January VHF Sweepstakes, and
2005 ARRL International DX CW contest continued. Rules announcements
for 2005 IARU HF Championships, Field Day 2005 and 2005 June VHF QSO
party were prepared and sent to Production. Backordered plaques arrived
and were shipped. Certificates for the 2004 IARU HF Championships were
printed and we will begin mailing them this week. Two issues involving
rules violations in the 2004 September VHF QSO party were investigated
and considerable time has been spent investigating the claims for
adjudication.
DXCC Branch
For the week of:
February 20, 2005
Beginning Credits 38,666
Credits Received 7,445
Credits Processed 7,029
Ending Credits 39,082
Applications Pending 298
Processing Time (Conventional) 5.4 Weeks
Processing Time (LoTW) 1 Working Day
DXCC is currently mailing applications received on January 20, 2005.
DXCC is currently entering credits received on January 20, 2005.
Logbook of the World
QSO records entered into the system 65,158,247
QSL records that have resulted 2,737,394
Logs Processed 102,168
Active Certificates 13,449
Users registered in the system 9,111
Current Applications 45
Ready Applications 0
Applications Awaiting Mail 45
QSL Bureau
Processing time is 5 days from receipt. This week 102 pounds of cards
were received from members. Cards mailed as of 02/27/05: 123,550. No
cards were mailed this week.
W1AW
Scott worked on slow and fast code practice files for the early part of
the month of March. He continues with assembling the SSB adapter module
for the Elecraft K2 QRP transceiver. Scott also handled some evening
phone sales calls in the daily 5 PM to 8 PM time slots.
Joe processed the FMT results and had them placed on the web. He
created a W1AW account with Space-Track, and updated both the satellite
tracking and weather-imaging programs with the new satellite Keplerian
elset requirements, as well as the program updates themselves. He also
processed regular W1AW QSL card requests. Joe also performed some
(W1AW) ListServer updates.
Field & Educational Services
Rosalie took part in a Dayton planning meeting, and then worked with Bob
on action items resulting from it. She moderated the
ARISS-International teleconference in Frank Bauer's absence, and gave a
report to the team on US schools. She prepared items for her upcoming
trip to NASA Hq and the CNCS grantor meetings. She attended part of the
TopOff planning meeting on Saturday. She began initial plans for the
upcoming South Dakota convention.
Field Organization/Public Service Team
SM election ballots were opened and counted on February 22. Tom
Blackwell, N5GAR, was elected NTX SM, and David Norris, K5UZ, was
elected in Arkansas. Leona sent follow-up letters to them; terms of
office begin April 1. Helping Leona with ballots were the following:
Chuck Skolaut, Gail Iannone, Margie Bourgoin and Steve Ewald. Leona and
Steve called the winners to start the process for their upcoming
leadership.
Chuck Skolaut compiled the monthly ARRL Monitoring System report.
Reports of interference to a Missouri 2-meter repeater are under
investigation, and OOs are also gathering documentation surrounding
improper language on a California repeater. Chuck attended the TopOff
planning meeting, representing F&ES. He received an observation report
from Rhode Island detailing 5- and 7-number code groups on 80 meters; we
are seeking more information on this.
Steve Ewald represented ARRL at the Citizen Corps monthly affiliates'
teleconference, where they discussed the upcoming TopOff drill in early
April. He mentioned on-going ARES plans to participate. Steve and
Chuck attended the planning meeting for the ARRL National Convention.
Steve will be on vacation next week, so he worked ahead and submitted
his Public Service column for QST.
Field-Education Team
Jean Wolfgang sent email to over 500 emcomm Level 2 course graduates to
remind them to register for the Level 3 course. She worked on updating
our mentor database and our student database to remove bad email
addresses. She sent out calls to mentors about mentoring students for
three courses. She processed and printed graduation certificates and ID
cards for recent emcomm graduates. While consulting with Dan Miller on
a Dayton handout for the EmComm classes, Jean suggested he include
information about the technical courses that we offer, in hopes of more
registrations for these courses.
Gail Iannone aided Bill Moore in finding a different hotel in Orlando
when his turned out to be very undesirable. She sent 11 hamfest
approval letters to sponsoring committees confirming the Division
Director's approval of their events as ARRL-sanctioned, and processed
six handout and door prize orders for upcoming events. She coordinated
travel for Wayne Mills to be the HQ rep at the Pacific Northwest DX
Convention, August 5-7 in Portland, OR, and for Chuck Skolaut to be the
HQ rep at the Kansas State Convention, August 21 in Salina. She sent
paperwork for six new clubs seeking ARRL-affiliation and two new SSC
applications to the Division Directors and SMs for their approval, along
with acknowledgement letters to the club officials. She counted ballots
for SM elections.
Norm Fusaro sent an e-mail newsletter to clubs updating them on new ARRL
resources now available. Among these are two new files Tom Hogerty
uploaded to the Web -- one is A Checklist For A Quality Mentor Program
and the other is Tips For A Successful Weekend License Class. In the
newsletter, Norm also highlighted the new QST feature that mentors can
use: "Getting to Know Your Radio," by Joel Hallas. Norm reviewed many
club newsletters and contacted several clubs about projects they
reported on. Some include converting a camper into a mobile emcomm
station, developing a mentor network, and a young ham that used ham
radio as part of his award winning science project.
Margie Bourgoin updated 70 club records and processed four SSC renewals.
She registered five new Volunteer Instructors and emailed instructor
support information to them. Margie helped count SM ballots. She did
some research and sent information to a member on the history of a club.
Margie communicated with an affiliated club in Western Washington
Section regarding their excellent new ham package. Many clubs have been
emulating this packet as a result of an ARRL Web story that we ran. The
club is providing a Word file that can be downloaded by other affiliated
clubs.
Community Education Program
Bill Barrett has scheduled more of his remaining presentations from now
through July 6th, and is awaiting final word from only three locations.
He has completed a template, now, for all pieces of the planning for his
presentations. He is developing a more in-depth guidance sheet for the
Citizen Corps Councils on when to send meeting invitations, how to
follow-up on that to estimate nose-count well before the meeting, and
issues for set-up and meeting management.
Amateur Radio Education & Technology Program
Mark Spencer is seeing good response to the FBI radio offer, and he's
dividing these among schools. Schools must send a formal request on
school letterhead, and Mark has already shipped radios to those schools
sending letters. The March QST Stray on an activity board has generated
a few requests from ham clubs running classes. Mark asks for a donation
($15, which is basically at cost) in return for the board and programmed
PIC. He reordered parts and boards to make a second offering to
schools. He solved a sine wave generator problem for the amplifier
activity board; the circuit board design for this is in draft.
Regulatory Information
John Hennessee made improvements to the regulatory material on several
ARRL Web pages, and updated contact information for the Volunteer
Counsel referral database. He also assisted amateurs with covenant
problems in Grossclose (Smith County), VA (K9CJM); Rockwell, TX (NA5BD)
and McKinney, TX (KG6JDD).
EmComm Grants
Dan Miller has sent materials to Oklahoma SM John Thomason for the ARRL
booth at the NOAA-sponsored governor's workshop in Midwest City, OK.
Dan is preparing materials for his 4-hour seminar at the Louisiana State
Convention in Rayne. He planned an announcement for Steve to send to
the Field Organization that reminds them that seats covered under the
grant-sponsored reimbursement of student registration fees will be
offered only until October, 2005.
Sincerely,
Dave Patton, NN1N
Special Assistant to the
Chief Executive Officer
DCP: lk
Staff Absentee List
All Staff 3/25 Holiday
Dave Sumner 3/3-3/4 IARU planning meeting, GA
`` 4/13-4/18 IARU Reg. 1 Conference
Preparatory Meeting, Croatia
Mary Hobart 3/2-3/4 CNCS Meeting, Washington, DC
`` 4/15-4/17 International DX Convention,
Visalia, CA
Dennis Motschenbacher 3/4-3/5 Icom meeting, Miami, FL
Bob Inderbitzen 3/21-3/23 National Postal Forum
`` 3/24 & 3/28 Vacation
`` 3/31-4/1 AES Superfest
Fatima Lorusso 3/7-3/11 Vacation
Kathy Capodicasa 3/21-3/23 National Postal Forum
`` 4/14-4/18 Vacation
Steve Ewald 2/25-3/8 Vacation
Rosalie White 3/2-3/4 CNCS Conference, NASA HQ
`` 3/7-3/8 Vacation
Jean Wolfgang 3/4-3/7 Vacation
Dan Miller 3/2-3/6 Nat'l Severe WX Workshop,
Midwest City, OK
`` 3/10-3/13 LA State Convention,
Rayne, LA
`` 3/21-3/24 Nat'l Hurricane
Conference, New Orleans, LA
`` 3/28-3/30 Vacation
Joel Kleinman 3/8 Vacation
`` 3/29 Vacation
Wayne Mills 3/11 North Carolina State Convention,
Charlotte, NC
`` 3/18 Great Lakes Division
Convention, Toledo, OH
Rick Lindquist 3/7 Medical
