Many kids under 10 years of age have their license. So can you.
Don't Put It Off - Get Started Today!!! |
These training videos are on reserve under our club advisor's name, Prof. Milton
Gosney, at CMIT - the Center for Media and Instructional Technology - in Fondren
Library West. CMIT has video players and headphones, so you can view these tapes
there, as your schedule permits. CMIT is open circa 70+ hours per week, including
on weekends. If you have SMU library checkout privileges (e.g., students, faculty..),
you can take these training videos and study guides out overnight. But be sure to
get them back in time to avoid any fines!
In addition to the Technician video training tapes, we also provide a series of
Technician training books by the ARRL called Q&A guides. The entire pool of
300 multiple choice questions and answers are published for the Technician exam.
Your exam will have only 35 questions on it, taken from this published pool of questions
and answers. You need to get only 75% of these correct to get your Technician exam.
These Q&A guides review each question, and provide you with more background during
your exam study. You can also simply download our Technician
Q&A Powerpoint slides and print and study them at your own pace too. We even have
a study sheet of key terms, technician VHF/UHF bands,
and other handy study materials. Print this out, carry it around with you and review
whenever you can. You will find most of the questions answered on this study guide!
We have newly installed the ARRL Technician course Question and Answer software on
our W5YF station PC. So you can visit the shack, and practice for that Technician exam
on some exams using the standard questions and answers series.
Get ahead! You can start now. As noted above, you can
download our Technician
Q&A Powerpoint slides and print and study them before the next class.
You can also download our Technician exam study sheet
of key terms, technician VHF/UHF bands, and other handy study materials. Carry this around
with you, and study these materials whenever you can. You will be ready for your Technician
exam fast!
The SMU amateur radio club also has an extensive library of ten shelves worth of books and
magazines on amateur radio related topics, including the ARRL's QST and other magazines. We
have the ARRL library of technical books, including the top rated ARRL Handbook - the "bible"
of amateur radio, the ARRL Operations Manual (on how to operate an amateur radio station), and
numerous other ARRL publications.
We have a growing library of other publications by AMSAT,
the amateur satellite corporation, on amateur satellite operations. We also have the Microwave
Experimenter's Guide and other resources for electronics hobbyists and builders.
using MP3 format for playing on your home or portable computer.
Thanks to a donation by Dr. Milton Gosney, we also have a set of ARRL morse code practice and training CDROMs.
Joe Rodgers has also offered to donate some tapes and CDROMs for use with the code training program too. Thanks
to both of these club members for helping out by making these resources available!
In the past, code exams of thirteen (13) and up to twenty (20) words per minute were required
to get the General and Amateur Extra class licenses. Today, you only need to demonstrate the
ability to receive 5 words per minute. Instead of weeks or months of practice, you should be
able to learn morse code at 5 w.p.m. in only a few weekends of study.
Since a "word" is typically 5 letters long, five words
per minute amounts to 25 letters per minute. That is more than two seconds for every letter!
You only need to copy one solid minute of 5 w.p.m. to pass the exam.
The exam is sent as plain
text, meaning that it is readable text, and not some random text. So if you copy "tse"
and realize that isn't a word in English, you could guess it should have been "the" and correct
it.
Because of international treaties, the U.S. and the Federal Communications Commission must
require some knowledge of the morse code for amateur radio operators using the long distance
shortwave or HF bands. After all, you wouldn't want to miss a distress call being sent as an
S.O.S. in morse, would you?
But as your reward for learning the morse code at 5 w.p.m., you can use a number of shortwave
or HF bands as a code-plus Technician (or Technician+). You can take the morse code
exam by itself, or with the Technician exam. If you pass both the Technician exam and the
morse code 5 w.p.m. exam, you are a code-plus Technician (or Technician+).
As a code-plus Technician, you
will be able to use the 80 meter, 40 meter, 15 meter, and 10 meter shortwave or HF bands
with various privileges (code, voice, data..). If you have not passed the morse code test,
you won't be able to use these shortwave bands as a technician. So why not go for this
next step, and learn and pass the morse code test too?
You can take the theory tests for the General and Amateur Extra exams when you want, even
if you can't pass the morse code test yet. When you have passed both the morse code and
General theory exam, you will get your General class license. Now pass the Amateur Extra
theory exam, and you will get the top license in U.S. amateur radio ranks - the Amateur
Extra Class. With this top license comes the full range of privileges available to any
U.S. amateur operator, on all amateur radio bands. Congratulations!
Please visit Larry's Site and read up on what you need
to take to the exam and what will happen there. You will need at least one photo identification;
your SMU photo ID, or a drivers license is fine. You will need some other sort of Identification,
which could be library card, credit card, or whatever. You will need $10 fee. Check the map
to the test site at Larry's site carefully, so you get to the right spot at Love Field airport.
Note that SMU students can take DART buses to reach the test site by 9 A.M. on Saturday morning.
Call DART at 214-979-1111 for latest information on current schedules and buses, which change
frequently now due to rail station additions.
Do you already have a social security number or U.S. taxpayer identification number?
Many working foreign students do, as part of their paperwork for fellowships and teaching
assistantships. You can use this social security number (or taxpayer ID#), just as the
U.S. citizens taking the exam use their social security number.
What if you don't have a social security number or U.S. taxpayer identification number?
You can simply go on-line (see FCC Cores/FRN links) and
register your name and address with the Federal Communications Commission (who issue
amateur licenses). The FCC will issue you a FRN, their registration number which serves
in place of a social security number for your exam and license. Your FRN number will enable
them to mail your license to you at the right address, and give you proper credit for
your upgrades after you pass higher level amateur radio exams.
If you don't have an FRN at
test taking time, your license may be delayed in processing until the FCC can issue you a FRN.
So you can still take the exam without a FCC issued FRN, and get full credit for passing the
exam. But you may be waiting longer for your license to arrive while the FCC issues you a FRN.
For more information on foreign student licensing issues, see discussion.
Videotape - New World of Amateur Radio - 9/14/87 ARRL Videotape - More About Radios - How to Get Started with Amateur Radio (Hosted by M.L. "Gib" Gibson W7Jie - Zman Productions ARRL Technician Licensing Course (3 tapes, 2 hours each) plus course manual plus test software (installed at W5YF PC) - at SMU's Fondren Library West - Center for Media & Instr. Technology Volume 1 - ARRL A/V Library [1996] Recruitment: 1) New World of Amateur Radio (28 1/2 min) 2) Ham Radio in Space (30 1/2 min) 3) Your Headquarters at Work (22 min) 4) ARRL Public Service Announcements (1 min) 5) Courage in The North - Handi-Ham Radio Camp (10 min) 6) Sharing Amateur Radio With Handi-Hams (10 1/2 min) Volume 2 - ARRL A/V Library [1996] 1) Ham Radio In Space (30 1/2 min) 2) SAREX Space Shuttle Mission STS-51F (18 min) 3) SAREX Space Shuttle Mission STS-58 (45 min) Volume 3 - ARRL A/V Library [1996] 1) When Disaster Strikes (10 min) 2) At Any Moment (14 min) 3) Field Day Fever (25 min) 4) Disaster Drill - The Big One (12 min) 5) Last Voice from Kuwait (25 min) Volume 4 - ARRL A/V Library [1996] 1) What Are those Crazy Sounding Signals Saying? (20 min) 2) This is Amateur Television! (30 min) 3) Packet Radio (30 min) 4) AMSAT Phase 3D (10 min) Volume 5 - ARRL A/V Library [1996] 1) Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Antennas
Volume 10 - ARRL A/V Library (1998) 1) 9N1MM Marshall Moran Tribute Dinner (56 min) 2) Amateur Radio in Elementary Schools (27 min) 3) FAIRS in the Former Soviet Union (13 min) 4) Genessee County (MI) RC-60th Anniversary (16 min) Volume 11 - ARRL ran out before they could fill our order ;-( Volume 12 - ARRL A/V Library [1998] 1) Phase 3D Integration Lab (25 mins) 2) JAS1B/Fuji 2 (28 mins) 3) SANDIA Robotics (12 mins) 4) SAREX at Center Street School (47 mins)