Last weekend I attended Ham Radio University (HRU). In years past I would check the schedule to see if it’s worth the travel time from the Mid-Hudson Valley. This year the schedule looked impressive enough to make the trip. There was no need to register for forums in advance and only a voluntary in-person $10 USD donation.
HRU was held at the Long Island University Post Campus. What would have taken two hours weekday was just a 75-minute Saturday ride for me and not much longer getting home. It is a beautiful campus. You first enter the Hillwood Commons Student Center where a welcome table, café, and various clubs represented with the sessions held in the Humanities Hall building nearby. Clubs in neighboring sections missed a good opportunity for visibility at the Student Center.
The sessions that drove me to attend were Meshtastic, Observing Everyday Wireless Communications, Cheap Space Communications, and 3D Printing in Amateur Radio. Because of overlap I was able to attend a piece of each of these plus the ARRL update.
Meshtastic attendance outgrew the room it was to be held in, so they moved it to the auditorium. Since I have worked with the tech before and knew the presentation would be posted, I opted to attend the ARRL update instead. I was torn because I was interested in Daniel W2DIY journey more than the tech. Fortunately, he did a recent post of his journey which is a great read.
I caught a good chunk of both Observing Everyday Wireless Communications and Cheap Space Communications. The former largely revolved around the use of Kismet, a wireless communications sniffer for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Zigbee, RF, and more, which runs on Linux and macOS. Again, an excellent presentation that I look forward to being posted on the HRU site. Cheap Space Communications showed how achievable it is for the average ham to get involved.
The ARRL update. While NLI and NNJ section managers were there, sadly there was no representation from ENY section. 2026 has been designated by the ARRL Board of Directors as the Year of the Club, recognizing that radio clubs are the backbone of ARRL. So, the conversation gravitated to improving the health of clubs. I sat in the back taking note of the demographics in attendance – mostly old white grey-haired males from the “baby boomer” era. There was discussion about how can you get youth engaged when they are “so into their phones.” To me, all the usual arguments filled the air that choose to look at the world from a perspective that age and experience should yield to. Since I fit the demographic but do not share the perspective, I figure my comments would be respected, at minimum, if not welcomed.
I said to engage youth, you need to understand their interests and motivation. The hacker community is arguably the greatest source of new licensed amateurs. Here are some stats from venues they are attracted to.
- DEF CON 33 (August 2025) a 100% pass rate for “Ham in a Day” class, with 32 students becoming licensed in a single afternoon. Over the entire weekend, the Ham Radio Village at DEFCON issued over 100 new licenses.
- HOPE (Hackers on Planet Earth – New York City) has a long-standing tradition of integrating radio into the hacker ethos. At HOPE XV (July 2024), “Ham in a Day” session resulted in at least 25 new licenses from a single class, with many more walk-in testing successes. HOPE has also had past successes in Amateur Radio growth.
“Baby boomers” who were hippies in the day seem to be the most embracing of this source of new hams and can relate to the hacker community.
My next comment was there is too much narcissism by older Amateur Radio licensees expecting their experience should be yielded to in any conversation with newer hams. I have heard this experience first-hand after a decade of helping setup and run the W2H special event station for past HOPE conferences at the Hotel Pennsylvania. I have met young women who are Extra class and can pound out perfect morse on a straight key who have spoke of the creepy old men they would run into that cannot be told anything.
Being a good Elmer means being a good listener, willing to learn from those you mentor, and willing to engage in forums they are comfortable with. “No such thing as a stupid question” emphasizes that a lack of understanding isn’t foolish and asking is better than pretending to know. This goes both ways if you want to be a good Elmer. Keep the goal to growing more hams and not as a way to recruit members into your club unless your club values and rewards the diversity they bring.
Which led to my last comment that some clubs should just die in the “Year of the Club.” A litmus for this could be each club have a Code of Conduct for Diversity and Inclusion. I can see some older hams cringe and think of all sorts of things. For them perhaps Star Trek’s Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations (IDIC) resonates. Having and enforcing this (which should be required of ARRL affiliated clubs) improves club culture and leads to a more welcoming experience for new hams into your club. Decades ago, QSY Society (an ARRL affiliated club) was born from a few hams who were disappointed with experiences with other local established clubs.
With that said, I applaud the forward thinking of Ham Radio University (HRU) in welcoming newer hams presenting engaging sessions that reflect the direction Amateur Radio needs to take. Thank you to those new presenters – your sessions were excellent – in sharing your journey and teaching this Extra class of forty plus years some new tricks.
73,
Joe, NE2Z