Welcome to our RI Section Newsletter for January 2025
Yes! Amateur Radio remains alive and well in Rhode Island with eighty (80) new Technicians licensed in the last year. Let’s get to work first looking at some data, and then begin exploring ways to use our spectrum privileges to creatively navigate 2025 together. How can amateur radio be a force multiplier of inspiration for us all in the coming year?
Did you know?
- For the last ten years (January 2015 – January 2025), the number of ARRL members in the RI Section has remained steady, plus or minus 10%.
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- Yes, it’s a niche hobby that we can do better explaining.
- Especially now when Amateur Radio is a more relevant hands-on learning gateway than ever before.
- Yes, the baseline “normal” fluctuates, but not (so far as I can see) outside these +/- 10% guardrails. Thank you for your consistent ongoing support.
- Over the last year, the number of FCC-licensed radio amateurs with a RI official address dropped by thirty (-30, or -1.6%). But what does that really tell us?
- For the last calendar year (December 30, 2023 – December 29, 2024) the total number of FCC-licensed radio amateurs in RI dropped from 1896 to 1865. Some of our RI hams have become Silent Keys. Others may have not renewed for any number of reasons, including older hams downsizing. Others may have moved outside the Ocean State because of work. Or perhaps for sunnier and/or less expensive locations?
- It would be great to have more data-driven insights into the roughly 1900 FCC-licensed amateurs in RI. How has the community demographic actually changed over five to ten years, and how is it changing now? This seems foundational to setting out an informed RI Section Strategic Plan for 2025.
- Over the last year, the RI Section welcomed EIGHTY (80) new Technicians.
- This includes 14 women, with 12 licensed since last Summer Field Day 2024.
- New Technician Jose Sandoval, KC1TWM has gone on to successfully restart the Brown University Amateur Radio Club as an officially-sanctioned School Club that will be on the air for School Club Roundup this February. Stay tuned on that!
- The ARRL New Amateur / License Upgrade Reports available to me also show 24 License upgrades from the available reports, Dec 05, 2023 through June 01, 2024.
- Congrats to all! This means over 4% of Rhode Island’s FCC-licensed radio amateurs were newly licensed over the last year. Let’s reach out and listen to what led them to get licensed. What’s their experience with amateur radio so far? What welcome and Get On the Air (GOTA) coaching would be helpful?
- The RI Section Affiliated Club Coordinator (RI-ACC), John Brewer, N1SXB, will be reaching out to the ARRL-affiliated clubs in Rhode Island to put together a coordinated process for sharing information about new RI hams, and then following up to see how clubs might best support the GOTA journey. We understand many hams belong to multiple clubs that meet each ham’s radio interest needs in different ways at different times. And, in our small state, location may not be the deciding factor. Please consider: What’s your club culture? How would you describe your welcome? What nets, club programs, POTA activations, antenna builds, public service options, and coaching can you point to as best practices to pitch to new hams? What’s working? And thank you for all you are doing already.
- Finally, please support ARRL and its Spectrum Protection mission at this critical time by joining or renewing for $59. We are all incredibly privileged to be living at a time when we are granted a remarkable opportunity to play on the amateur radio frequency bands and learn something new every day with a remarkable growth-mindset Super Community. Never a dull moment! The hobby for a lifetime.
- For more on the $17,000+ Dream Icom Station sweepstakes membership drive, check out: https://www.arrl.org/arrl-sweepstakes
From Dr. Tamitha Skov’s August 2024 Keynote address at the New England HamXposition in nearby Marlborough, Massachusetts. (SpaceWeatherWoman.com)