KG5VK Shack 2024

 KG5VK

Upshur Area Amateur Radio Club is Hosting a Ham Radio 101 Four week Class

If you want to learn more about what to do with your amateur radio license
Take this Course !!! 

This Course will be held Four weeks in September 2024
In the County of Upshur, Texas. (Near Gilmer in the North Texas Section)

Week One – Sep 3
1.1 Introduction and what you should learn.
1.2 How to earn a certificate of completion.
1.3 How Ham Radio is different from other services;
GMRS, CB, public service,
Amateur Radio Frequency Spectrum,
Formal structure,
National League is ARRL,
Technical Contributions,
Public service,
Emergency communications,
Introduction to ARRL publications – Radio Handbook and Antenna book.
1.4 The RF Frequency Spectrum from 500 kHz to 150 GHz.
1.5 FCC license requirements and associated privileges.
1.6 Ham radio equipment and parts suppliers.
1.7 Common VHF/UHF Ham frequencies and HT propagation.

Limited Seats sign up now at.....
Ham Radio 101 Course Signup form

To see the complete Syllabus click below....

Syllabus for Ham Radio 101 Class

Graduating Students will be afforded the opportunity to win one of Two Door Prizes
An ARRL Handbook Or ARRL Antenna Handbook

Instructor is
John Keith
W5BWC
jlk@bwcelectronics.com

Questions and Comments may also be directed to your ARRL NTX Section Manager
Steven Lott Smith
KG5VK@ARRL.ORG

K1VR gets denial letter from ARRL E&E, in my opinion Just another way for the CEO to suppress ARRL member Voices - Steve KG5VK

 My URL KG5VK.com

is officially in the past.

Current info going forward will be shared using this currently free toolset Blogger.com

Also with the Ransomware break at the ARRL mycallsign@.org is not working

Simply use mycallsign@ARRL.NET or my personal email address
LottsPhoto@Gmail.com

Word is ARRL LOTW is back online,

However more than a few of us including myself are unable to get logged into it.
It appears to be either a work in progress and/or is getting to much traffic right now.
I'll wait a week or two more to try again.

Cheers!

Steve

KG5VK

Milestones Accomplished during our tenure as SM for NTX

 Greetings fellow ARRL North Texas Amateur Radio OPS

I took office on April the 1st, 2019

During my Campaign to be your Section Manager
I pledged I would be a visible Section Manager,
I hope you feel I have done that and much more.

Before taking office, I gladly took many phone calls, and emails with questions and comments, I continue to talk with fellow ARRL members on a weekly sometimes daily basis.

While I have not solved everyone's concerns. I have always listened and followed up with answers to questions that I may not have had at the time of initial contact.
I have been publishing a Monthly Newsletter since my appointment as your Section Manager, this is a small part of the process of staying in touch with the members I serve.

Some highlights of our Section Management Team accomplishments:

• Appointed a Section Youth Coordinator, which is one of Youth.
  Katherine Forson KT5KMF should, by now be well known to any ARRL NTX member.
  She was highlighted in QST the same year she was appointed with a full page article
  and continues to serve us proudly by sharing what Ham Radio is with both young and old.

• Asked and Received Nominees for an ARRL North Texas Ham Radio Operator of the Year 2019/2020.  Appointed an award committee from the Section Management team to vote on the nominees.  I presented the Award to Jim Erickson KB0DBJ president of MJARS at their September 2019 club meeting. 
• We have continued to Award a North Texas ARRL Ham of the Year Award every year, since I took office in 2019.
• Within the First Seven months of taking office as your Section Manager
  I attended Nine Ham Fests, Seventeen Different Club Meetings, Two JOTA events and a visit to the EOC at the Plano Balloon fest. I also appeared at Eleven different ARRL FD sites.
• I have attended the Belton Ham fest every year since taking Office (with one exception in 2023), this is significant because the ARRL members from that area had for several years been in pursuit of being realigned by the ARRL with South Texas, until I showed them the support they deserve. 
• Began Monthly ARRL NTX Section Management Team Staff meetings, held virtually with Teleconferencing tools.

• October 2020 we began conducting Quarterly Zoom conferences with ARRL NTX Affiliated Club officers and the ARRL NTX Section Staff members.  These meetings came from a suggestion received by one of the club officers during a recent round table conference with myself and John Robert Stratton N5AUS our ARRL West Gulf Division Director.
• I continued to attend club meetings on a Virtual basis with those clubs that are having Virtual Meetings during this time of COVID19 Social Distancing.
  
• Post COVID I still use Zoom conferencing tools to attend virtual club meetings as well as in person meetings Monthly. 
• Built a strong working relationship with Section Managers and their Staff near and far from our Section, doing so betters our readiness to respond to neighboring Sections that need our assistance with ECOM and allows them willingness to assist us in times of need.  I feel we can always learn from others and therefore maintain contact with all the fellow Section Managers within the ARRL West Gulf, and Delta Divisions, as well as several Section Managers beyond those borders.
• We have assembled an outstanding team of assistants, from Greg Evans K5GTX our Section Emergency Coordinator, to all the other Assistants on the Section Management team. Our team works as a cohesive unit for the betterment of our fellow ARRL members which we serve.
• As of early 2024 our Team has awarded Five ARRL NTX HOY Awards, Five Section manager Certificate of Merit Awards, and seen Two ARRL North Texans awarded the Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Youth Award. In addition Jo Ann Keith KA5AZK of 7290 Traffic NET Fame was awarded the George Hart Distinguished Communicator Award from ARRL Headquarters.
  
  
  Early in 2021
  Thanks to Greg Evans K5GTX and Aaron Hulett K8AMH for many hours of work and planning,  our team unveiled the new ARRL North Texas website https://arrlntx.org
  
  Our Section Management Staff Team continues to work for each and every North Texas ARRL member, if you feel you would like to be a part of our team, please drop me an email of what you would like to contribute, we presently have over 18 staff members. 
  
  Thank you for your time and your service as an ARRL member!
  
  Steve KG5VK
  KG5VK@ARRL.ORG

ARRL Members Forum Recoding from Visalia

In my opinion, every ARRL member should set-aside 90 minutes and listen to the dialogue here 

Yes this is a bit long.

Yes it is worth listening to
You can skip toward the last 30 minutes

If you enjoyed the recent ARRL’s CEO Reset Editorial you will love the facts that Mr. Dick Norton addresses.

Of course the CEO claims their are half truths, misleading and taken out of Context

Here is the link to the YouTube Video

https://youtu.be/NsNX6sWZNLQ

Steve KG5VK
ARRL NTX Section Manager

ARRL NTX ARES Team at Paris EOC

 Several members of the Red River Valley Amateur Radio Club
were spot lighted in the recent ARRL News Letter
(An Emailed Newsletter sent to those members which have signed up for same)
Steve KG5VK

ARRL Members may opt in or opt out of this Newsletter as well as news from their ARRL Division Director and Section manager.....

Free of charge to ARRL members...

• Subscribe to the ARES Letter (monthly public service and emergency communications news), the ARRL Contest Update (biweekly contest newsletter), Division and Section news alerts, and much more!

The ARRL Letter is published Thursdays, 51 times each year. ARRL members may subscribe at no cost or unsubscribe by editing their Member Data Page at www.arrl.org/opt-in-out.