K2BSA Amateur Radio Association — dedicated to amateur radio within the Scout movement. Providing information to support all Radio Scouting activities.
Neil Rapp, WB9VPG, of Ham Talk Live hosted Will Jourdain, AA4WJ, from Icom America and Jim Wilson, K5ND, from the K2BSA Amateur Radio Association to talk about Scouting and Ham Radio, including Icom America’s support of amateur radio in Scouting.
Listen to Ham Talk Live Episode 21 – Scouting and Ham Radio. It’s a great discussion of all the exciting things going on in Radio Scouting.
All the latest news about Jamboree on the Air and Radio Scouting is available in the July Newsletter. You can find it at July JOTA Newsletter.
Don’t miss another issue. Subscribe at JOTA Email Sign Up.
Larry Peterson, WB9KMW, provided this write up on the Fox Cities Amateur Radio Club’s Field Day Merit Badge Program. The FCARC is located in Menasha, Wisconsin, and from all appearances they are doing a great job of extending the reach of amateur radio within Scouting. Thanks for writing up and forwarding this story, Larry, and for all you and your club do for amateur radio and Scouting.
This story should provide lots of insight into things you can do for your own events, including Jamboree on the Air.
We had 28 scouts plus parents/troop leaders in attendance. I was amazed that our announcement attracted scouts from Green Bay to Sussex!
The welcoming began at 12:30 pm. We had a few scouts come earlier so they were given a tour of the Field Day ham radio grounds. We kicked off promptly at 1 pm and stayed right on schedule for the entire afternoon.
The program flow worked smoothly, as we were able to transition from classroom instruction to our three guest speakers who talked about careers in radio: Tony AB9IO Metrology, Paul KD9AYP Telecommunications and Steve W9APL Radio Engineer.
After a 20-minute refreshment break, we resumed classroom training on radios, components and circuits, and then at 3:30 pm we moved to the all-important ’10 minutes of air time’ for each scout.
Back-to-back, this radio air time would have taken 4 1/2 hours! But we developed a creative, simple, highly efficient process involving Badger Scout Assistance (BSA) nets. 
This could be scaled based on the number of scouts, from 4 to 10 scouts per net. Hence, we ran three nets on three separate 2 meter simplex frequencies. We oriented scouts, assigned radios (21 HTs in total), set up net control operations, did radio tests with legal identification, conducted simulated emergency nets which were clearly communicated as only a test, secured each Rover station with proper call identification at the end of their assignment and re-inventoried all radios in under 40 minutes. A heck of an accomplishment which went off without a hitch.
There were 18 scouts outside, six per net, operating as Rovers and color coded with tactical calls: red, white, blue, yellow, green and purple. Three hams were there to help guide them and keep them on task for this exercise.
Ken KC9RHW was the architect of this net concept. He put in a great deal of creative effort to conceive of and produce the signage for each ‘house.’ Here is one entertaining example, where a parakeet was lost on one street and reported by another scout as found on another street!
It was then back to classroom training. We wrapped things up at about 5:30 pm, as planned, and then scouts got in line to have their Radio merit badge workbook reviewed for completeness by one of our instructors, and then over to me to sign off on their ‘blue card’ to award them their Radio merit badge as a certified Radio merit badge counselor for the Gathering Waters scout district.
Many FCARC members felt this was a great thing to offer during Field Day. We may repeat the Radio merit badge every other year.
Next year we are already thinking about offering training for the Electronics merit badge.
Thanks very, very much to all who helped with setup or take down, who spoke to the scouts, who assisted with the emergency net simulation and who programmed and provided all those HTs in advance.
73,
Larry WB9KMW
Over the years we’ve heard many stories about the challenges of getting Jamboree on the Air started in a Scout council that all too often appears to be oblivious to the largest Scouting event in the world. This past week we had this email message arrive:
I am wondering if there is someone at K2BSA that can come into our council and get the ball rolling for ham radio. I tried setting up my own station during JOTA at the scout camp last year and had poor results with visitation by Scouts.
We’re sure that many of you have thought of sending a similar message. And, maybe there is someone nearby who could help. In fact, there may even be other JOTA stations in operation within your council that neither you nor your council know about.
Even so, we know that you can make a difference. In response to this email, Donald Sonnefeld, KD2FIL, Radio Scouting Chairman of the Greater Niagara Frontier Council and Secretary for the K2BSA Amateur Radio Association had this response. You’ll find it offers sound insight that can also be used in your own efforts.
DON’T GIVE UP!! You are the right person for the job, you just need more people on your team. (In Scouting, we always want more people on our team.)
I started organizing JOTA stations for the Greater Niagara Frontier Council in Buffalo, NY in 2012. The first couple years we had less than 10 Scouts—the first year we coaxed them in from the Scout Shop while their parents were shopping. The next year we had a couple that actually came specifically for it. We’ve had the most success when we piggy-backed district camporees that had been scheduled on the same weekend. We contacted the event organizers and told them (not asked) that we were going to set-up a station. Some put us in the program rotation, others offered it as a free-time activity. They were all glad to have more program options for their event. This year we specifically targeted Arrow of Light Scouts, since the new program includes an adventure requirement that specifically mentions Jamboree On The Air. (Building A Better World, 10d).
Over the last year we have organized a Radio Scouting Committee in our Council. It started small, but as we got the word out Scouter Hams started coming to us. We’ve even had a couple long-time Scouters get licensed. We set-up a demo station at our University of Scouting, at Spring Camporees, and are going to put up a station in our Scout Camp this summer. A local Rotary club provided grant money to buy equipment for the Council. We also partnered with a local Radio Club who has been fantastic about providing assistance. We discovered that there are active Scouters involved in 4 different area clubs, and we are now trying to get their help as well. We sent flyers for all districts to use in their annual Program Launch. (Every June we dedicate a Roundtable to sharing information on the upcoming program year to the units). During the year we try to go where the boys are and do things that spark interest. One example: we take a CW oscillator and a copy of the Morse code and invite Scouts to tap out their name. When they do they get a certificate that has 2 “tickets” to upcoming Amateur Radio Events. (I’ve attached a copy—feel free to modify & use. BTW, I used a Morse code font and spelled out messages for the name, signature, and date lines.) [Here’s the file for download Morse Code Certificate]
Don’t get me wrong, it has been frustrating at times. But as you work with the Council Staff and district volunteers to find opportunities to promote your events you’ll find greater numbers participating, which will generate interest going forward. Ask the Council Scout Executive to appoint a staff advisor to help draw resources. Now is the time to start putting it together. We had our first JOTA planning meeting last night.
That’s superb advice. It’s all about getting started whether that’s at the council, district, or even the unit level. You can make this happen.
We’ve published a great deal of resources on this website that are meant to provide insight into working with your local council. Here’s the starting list:
I would also recommend reaching out to your local ham radio club and getting them involved. It’s a tough task for any single individual.
Now’s the time to get started. Good luck.
