[CW] One Day to Extra Class

[Pedro J. Santa]

As a subscriber to this CW reflector, and as an Extra Class Operator who was
required to pass the 20 WPM test (but only seven years ago--before the
"downgrade" that now prevails) I am compelled to respond to the various
comments in this reflector which criticize the present Extra Class Exams and
are meant to revive times when passing amateur rardio exams entailed showing
up at an FCC office to face ruthless war veterans who were eager to avenge
their war miseries. I suggest we all drop that kind of diatribe, for the
good of our hobby.

I'm a firm pursuer of the goal of attracting the best motivated and smartest
young people we can to this past time, recognizing that the hobby faces
competition that's extremely hard to beat.  Let's face it, friends, ham
radio no longer attracts the bulk of the highly IQ-ed technically-oriented
persons it might have lured in times past (although even then those who
ventured into this hobby were viewed as "spooky" by other equally talented
youngsters). What the "old timers" miss today is the fact that present
technological and communications reality has rendered totally absurd the
type of "quasi-doctoral tests" for amateur radio operators like the exams
which some of the writers here have self-servingly described (Come on, don't
exaggerate; many "regulars" were able to pass those tests without loosing an
eyebrow!). The fact is that in those past times amateur radio licensees were
deemed to be grantees of a highly-prized governmental privilege, bound on
the emergency-driven nature of the service, when CW reigned and
opportunities for worldwide communications through the phone wall outlet
were not even a notion among regular citizens.

It's simply absurd to gauge our present realities against the backdrop of
what is now, so soon, the equivalent of a "jurassic" period in the century
that just passed.

I, for one, am a fervent CW operator (no CW keyboards here, uggghhhh!), and
will continue to relish the notion of pure, traditional wireless
communications. But to insist on the kind of examinations that were tailored
to an era that is GONE, period... is pure and simple nonsense, unless we are
just set on ensuring a sooner death knoll for our hobby than the one that's
looming out there and is inevitably approaching. Let's welcome reality,
fellows, and let's try to keep our hobby attractive to as many motivated and
talented youngsters as we can, while we can...

73 Pedro KP3X..




>>Seems to me that what the "one day extra" class really shows is that the
>>tests have been watered down to the point where a reasonably intelligent
>>person with a little background can pass them with just a one-day cram
>>course.
>
>That's exactly what happened to the old first class commercial
>radiotelephone licence.  It was needed to opreate a broadcast station.
>Station managers didn't want to pay the salary for a station engineer, so
>they started looking for disc jockeys with 1st phones to legally opreate
the
>station.  They didn't care if they didn't know a tube from a resistor.
>
>Companies soon sprang up offering cram courses, with money-back guarantees
>if the candidate didn't pass.  These became known as "30-day wonders" in
the
>broadcast industry.  I recall that the FCC acknowledged being aware of what
>was going on, and abolished the 1st class phone ticket, along with the
>requirement for any commercial FCC licence to operate a broadcast station.
>Stations no longer had to hire engineers.  They just operated, and now
>mostly depend on on-call "consultants" to repair things when something
>breaks down.  The "chief engineer" at small town broadcast stations is now
a
>part of radio  history.  With the new more trouble-free solid state
>broadcast equipment, the FCC feels a resident engineer is no longer a
>necessity.
>
>Don K4KYV
>
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