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Vol. 33, No. 25
June 23, 2010 -- Covers the period June 13-19.
Upcoming Meetings and Events
Programs & Services Committee: July 15, 2010 @ 8:30am - ARRL HQ
Administration & Finance Committee: July 15, 2010 @ 8:30am - ARRL HQ
Second Board Meeting: July 16-17, 2010 @ 9:00am in Windsor, CT
Media & Public Relations
Reported by Allen Pitts, W1AGP
The annual report is at the printer and may be available in hardcopy by
the end of the week. The web version is up. Results of the wire
releases are mixed, but seeing once again heavy use of parts and quotes
from the releases rather than the whole document. Lots of club and
group media hits also. 18 state level proclamations so far, almost 300
now following on Twitter and a number of major hits. Amateur Radio was
also portrayed in a good way on History Detectives this past week. This
was pleasant to see as their initial plan when they first contacted us
in doing their research was to show us as still being in the 1960-70
era. But it all came out well. QST article for 75th anniversary of
ARES is in final editing.
Development
Reported by Mary Hobart, K1MMH
The new Spectrum Defense newsletter is in final stages.
ARRL received a $10,000 irrevocable planned gift commitment for the
Spectrum Defense Fund of the ARRL Endowment.
The W1AW Endowment Campaign has reached $71,367.
The Diamond Club gross revenue has topped $135,000 through 6/22/2010.
CDO Hobart will visit the Town Council of West Hartford CT to accept the
town's Field Day Proclamation on community television.
Development submitted the departmental reforecast of revenues and
expenses for 2010.
Production/Editorial
Reported by Joel Kleinman, N1BKE
The August 2010 issue of QST was released to the printer June 22.
The July/August issue of QEX and the Central States VHF Conference
Proceedings were also released to the printer.
Steve Sant Andrea reports that he's had a positive response to his
article, "When Should I Operate?" in the July issue of QST.
Khrystyne Keane wrote and distributed The ARRL Letter and voiced and
produced ARRL Audio News for June 17, 2010.
Lab
Reported by Ed Hare, W1RFI
D Star Repeater
Bob Allison formally requested frequency coordination of our new D-Star
repeater, which is located in the Lab here at HQ. The formal letter and
the proper forms were submitted to the Connecticut Spectrum Management
Association. It is hoped they will grant us temporary coordination on
the frequencies 147.390/147990 MHz, for a period of 6 months. During
this period, it is hoped that we will not cause interference to
co-channel and adjacent channel repeaters. If we do, all complaints
must be addressed before permanent coordination is granted. Initial
testing of our coverage suggests there will be no interference issues
with co-channel repeaters.
TIS
Anthony Nesta returned this week from a long medical leave of absence.
Product Review
Bob Allison tested two handheld transceivers and a kit transceiver.
Sales and Marketing
Reported by Bob Inderbitzen, NQ1R
A large membership campaign that mailed during the second week of June
has returned 55 members in the first 5 days. Additionally, a couple of
targeted email messages promoting membership were sent to lapsed
members.
A direct mail test is underway, comparing the response rate of two
different membership mailings to new hams. Response rates will be
measured for 3 months.
We continue to test and report-on web site development issues requiring
further attention, particularly those involving the new e-store and
Guest Accounts.
Diane Petrilli is coordinating tour guide volunteers for the upcoming
ARRL Teachers Institute. Tour guides will be available during the
session lunch breaks to help teachers get on the air from W1AW. Also,
Diane is arranging to have tour guides come in on August 6 to learn more
about the Education & Technology Program so they can help explain the
program to visitors.
Good progress is being made on the development of new ARRL practice exam
software for the Amateur Radio license exams. The developers held a
webinar during the week to review the first iteration of the software
build. A beta version will be delivered to our evaluation team within
the next 2 weeks. The software will be completed during the summer, in
time to introduce it into license manuals by the fall.
During the last week 2 weeks, the warehouse crew fulfilled 1,906
packages for publication and product orders, 809 membership premiums,
and QST mailing supplements.
We have decided to offer a Touch Paddle Keyer Kit as an ARRL product
offering. This is the same kit used by Bob Allison to support the
"Project Building" activity in Dayton. The kits will be supplied to
ARRL by Mark Spencer, WA8SME, Education and Technology Program
Coordinator. This new offering builds on other recent, successful ARRL
ventures involving sales of hardware and kits. We have sold over 1,000
MFJ Cub transceiver kits, and many hundreds of the Kanga-supplied
Hands-On Radio Parts Kit. We'll take delivery of the keyer kits in
approximately 4 to 6 weeks. We are also investigating suppliers to help
offer a kit associated with our newest book, ARRL's PIC Programming for
Beginners.
A new resource guide, titled the Quick Start Guide for All Hams, is
being finalized. The guide will be included with a mailing sent to all
new hams. It contains 4 new articles all geared toward new licensees,
and includes several operating resources such as a frequency chart and
other handy tables to encourage readers to retain the guide. This
project is supported by advertising included throughout the guide, all
coordinated by the ARRL Business Services team.
Membership & Volunteer Programs
Reported by Dave Patton, NN1N
W1AW
Joe updated the web code practice files. He also processed regular QSL
card requests. Joe "went mobile" with the station's Icom IC-2820 D-Star
radio to determine the western coverage of the W1HQ D-Star repeater
system (2-meters).
Scott worked on slow and fast code practice files for the latter part of
the month of June. He also assisted the DXCC department with the
editing of applications.
Field Organization/Public Service Team
The Tennessee Official Observer Coordinator was asked to have his
Official Observers check out possible infractions occurring on a local
repeater. Amateurs from Kentucky, Mississippi, and Michigan
successfully completed certification to become Official Observers this
week. The monthly Official Observer summary was compiled and forwarded
to all OOs, OOCs, and Section Managers. The monthly ARRL Monitoring
System/Intruder Watch report was also prepared and forwarded it to the
IARU Region 2 coordinator. A radio amateur from Northern New Jersey was
approved and added to our Intruder Watch group this past week.
John Szwarc, N3SPW, of Kylertown, Pennsylvania, has been nominated to
run for Section Manager of Western Pennsylvania for the next term of
office that begins on January 1, 2011. Incumbent Section Manager John
Rodgers, N3MSE, has already been nominated to run for a new term of
office. Nominating petitions for Western Pennsylvania and eight other
sections in the same election cycle are due at ARRL Headquarters on
September 10.
Education Services
Reported by Debra Johnson, K1DMJ
Education & Technology Program
The May round of grant applications have been summarized and
recommendations sent to the Executive Committee. Jennifer Knapp has
coordinated hotel reservations for all remaining Teachers Institutes.
She and Mark Spencer WA8SME have been coordinating resource orders for
all of the sessions. All materials for the TI-2 Space in the Classroom
from Yaesu and HRO have been delivered.
Mark Spencer completed a Teachers Institute in Roswell, New Mexico May
24-27 with 13 teachers, and another session just last week in Walhalla,
SC with 10 teachers. A representative from NASA Education participated
in the SC session on behalf of the ARISS program.
As part of research for future curriculum, Mark attended a CubeSat
conference at California Polytechnic. He reports that the CubeSat
community is doing some exciting things. One of his major observations
was the lack of effort to include community college and below school
programs in their efforts. He is looking at how to address that issue
and continues dialog with AMSAT about their interest in the CubeSat
program.
After returning from three intense days fielding questions and providing
demonstrations at the Dayton Hamvention, Miguel Enriquez KD7RPP returned
home to attend a 24 hour curriculum-writing course presented by Pima
County Joint Technical Education District. Miguel is part of the JTED
team that will write the curriculum and lesson plans for Arizona
Audio/Visual Program State Standards this summer. He will be working on
adding communication and the use of radio-including Amateur Radio-and
television to the Audio / Visual curriculum. Miguel is adding emergency
communication activities to the existing program.
The Arizona Spelunkers have requested use of the underwater robot that
employs ATV which was developed by Miguel's Pueblo High School students
to explore a second, much larger cave lake recently discovered in
Northern Arizona. Recognizing the advancements and successes the radio
club students are making, Miguel has been awarded grant resources to
purchase equipment and supplies to expand technology and electronics
education curriculum.
Nathan McCray K9CPO worked the VEC booth at the Dayton Hamvention but
was also able to take time out to provide a demonstration of the
classroom CubeSat simulator for the AMSAT group. Nathan returned home
to gear up for the Teachers Institutes he will be leading in June and
July at Parallax and HQ, contacting teachers and fine-tuning his
instruction. He reports that he has been collecting data from his
robotics students to see how well they did on the Illinois state tests
as compared to all of the students in the state and reports that they
did not disappoint. "They all blew the doors off the test, just like
last year, and finished in the top 10% of the state." With the
objective of getting ham radio back into the picture, next year Nathan
plans to start a Morse code class to go along with robotics.
ARISS
Astronaut Kevin Ford, who is in training for a future ISS mission, and
Astronaut Ron Garan, who is slated for Expedition 27, worked with the
ARISS Houston Team and received their amateur radio licenses. Expedition
27 now has a licensed crew member.
An ARISS contact was a highlight for the Nippon Boy Scout Amateur Radio
Club in Mitaka-shi, Japan on May 4. The scouts have been studying
Amateur Radio station operations and spoke with Astronaut Soichi
Noguchi, a former Boy Scout.
Students at the Pita Kallak School in Kuujjuaq, Quebec, have been
learning about the ISS and radio protocol, and have had guest speakers
talking about these subjects. Students created materials and exhibits
that tell the story of what they learned, and these items were displayed
in the school's "Mission Control" (set up in the gymnasium). The
highlight of their studies was an ARISS QSO on May 20. The school plans
to form a space club with participants from all grade levels.
Licensing Support and Continuing Education Program
Jennifer Knapp is doing a great job as CEP administrator and has been
challenged to fill the gap managing CEP processes formerly available to
students and mentors for "self-service" through the website. Jon Bloom
recently restored our ability to retrieve data from the main database to
print certificates so Jennifer was able to catch up on the backlog of
student course completion certificates and get those in the mail last
week.
We are in the process of retiring online courses on the current platform
and are responding to many inquiries about the future of online courses.
We have worked out a plan for revision of the Basic EmComm (Level 1)
course, which will be redeveloped for a new online course platform.
Allen Pitts W1AGP will be the content editor and will work closely with
Mike Corey W5MPC who will be content handling editor. We continue to
receive applications for the final assessment for the new EmComm
managers course (EC-106). Feedback about the course has been
consistently positive. The documentation and recommendation process for
the final assessment application has been running smoothly. There have
been over 35 completions of the final assessment so far. We are in
process of negotiating a contract with an author for revision of the
Technician Instructor Manual which will be published in late 2010.
Jenny Hawran has resigned for health reasons after only three months
with us but contributed a great deal to communications about education
department programs and development of information on our web pages. We
will sorely miss her! We have posted her position and are looking for a
capable replacement.
Sincerely Compiled by,
Lisa Kustosik, KA1UFZ
Assistant to the CEO
Staff Absentee List
All Staff 7/5 Holiday
Kathy Allison 7/6-7/9 Vacation
Bob Allison 7/6-7/9 Vacation
Joe Carcia 7/2-7/9 Vacation
`` 7/16 Vacation
`` 7/23 Vacation
`` 7/30 Vacation
`` 8/6-8/13 Vacation
`` 8/20 Vacation
Michael Cory 7/30-8/6 APCO Conference, Houston, TX
`` 8/20-8/22 Southeastern Division
Convention, Huntsville, AL
Steve Ewald 6/24 Vacation
Steve Ford 6/25 Vacation
`` 7/6-7/9 Vacation
Norm Fusaro 6/23-7/2 Vacation
Scott Gee 8/30-8/31 Vacation
Katie Glass 6/28-7/7 Vacation
Mike Gruber 6/19-6/26 Vacation
`` 8/23-8/27 Vacation
Joel Hallas 7/14-7/20 Vacation
Penny Harts 6/30-7/2 Vacation
Dan Henderson 6/22-7/5 Friedrichshafen/Vacation
Amy Hurtado 7/14-7/26 Vacation
Bob Inderbitzen 6/22-6/30 Friedrichshafen, Germany /
Vacation
`` 8/23-8/27 Vacation
Joel Kleinman 6/29 Vacation
Linda Kleinschmidt 6/28-6/29 Vacation
Harold Kramer 7/29-8/6 Vacation
Zack Lau 7/12-7/23 Vacation
Dave Patton 8/6-8/7 Texas State Convention, Austin,
TX
Diane Petrilli 8/23-8/27 Vacation
Allen Pitts 6/30-7/2 Vacation
`` 7/26-7/28 Vacation
Steve Sant Andrea 6/23 Vacation
`` 8/30 Vacation
Barry Shelley 8/9-8/20 Vacation
`` 8/26-8/27 Vacation
Dave Sumner 6/23-6/28 Friedrichshafen, Germany
`` 6/29-7/13 Vacation
