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It's time for HamTalk Live episode number 284.
IARU Region 2 Youth, recorded live on Thursday,
December 16th, 2021. I'm your host, Neil Rapp,
WB9VPG. Thanks for tuning in to this episode
of HamTalk Live. Tonight, we're joined by Sterling
Mann in Zero SSC, and we'll take your calls live
in just a few minutes. Last week, the crew from
Amateur Radio Newsline was here to talk about
Newsline present and past. If you missed that
show, you can listen anytime at HamTalkLive .com
or on your favorite podcast app or YouTube. Or
you can catch the rebroadcast of HamTalk Live
every Saturday afternoon on WTWW. That's 5085
on your AM dial. And that's again, Saturday afternoons.
It usually runs about 3 .30 p .m. Eastern Time.
So get your questions ready to go. If you're
listening to us live on Thursday night, you'll
be able to call us a little later on in the show.
uh... but i'll go ahead and give you the phone
number so you have it uh... ready to dial it
is eight five nine nine eight two seventy three
seventy three again eight five nine You can also
tweet us, it's at HamTalk Live on Twitter. If
you're on Spreaker, you can type in the comments
and that'll show up here on the screen as well.
And I'll be back with Sterling and talk more
with him right after this word from ICOM America,
right here on HamTalk Live. Happy holidays from
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At HamTalk Live we have a million dollar request
guarantee. You give us a million dollars and
we'll do a show about whatever ham topic you
request. Guaranteed! Welcome back to Ham Talk
Live. Tonight, Sterling Mann in Zero SSC joins
us on the Orlando Amateur Radio Club and Amcation
Zoom line. Sterling is from St. Louis, Missouri.
He's currently an antenna design engineer for
one of those big aerospace companies in St. Louis.
Sterling became a ham at age 16. and is one of
the former youth editors at ARRL and has his
own YouTube channel about ham radio. And he's
the president of the Young Amateurs Radio Club,
better known as YARC. And he is a co -founder
of Youth on the Air. And his hat that he's wearing
tonight is the IARU Region 2 Youth Liaison. So
Sterling, welcome back to the show. Hello again.
It's good to be back. Thanks for having me on.
I'm always glad to talk about youth. Yep. And
this has been on my radar for quite a while.
And I thought, well, I'm going to let Sterling
get a chance to announce this. And then I'm like,
and then I never got back to it. So we're going
to talk about this youth liaison thing tonight
and talk a little bit about some of the things
that have been happening behind the scenes. You
know, you've probably heard, you know, if you've
listened to this show, you've heard about Yoda
camp and, and all, all the activities going on
with Yoda camp and Yoda month. Uh, but what you
haven't necessarily heard, um, on this show,
at least is some of the stuff that's been going
on, uh, across region two, not just in the U
S and trying to build up some international Yoda
stuff. So talk a little bit about your role as
a youth liaison. What does that entail and what
are you trying to do? Sure. So kind of backtracking
a bit, back in 2016, you've all heard this story
again, but I'll reiterate it. 10 seconds or less.
I went to the Austrian Yoda camp in 2016, Youth
on the Air camp, and with the goal of bringing
youth on the air, or youngsters on the air, to
region two. Region two being the Americas, all
the way from Canada all the way down to Argentina.
All the Americas, right? So Youth on the Air
was created, and that includes the camp that
you, Neil, are the director of, and you're very
familiar with, and a lot of our listeners are
too. But also, all of these other activities
and resources that have been put out for youth
have been going on as well. In fact, this came
kind of after all of the Yoda camp work. We were
working with the IRAU, International Amateur
Radio Union, of Region 2. There are obviously,
again, three IRAUs for each region. region plus
like the overarching one, to kind of formalize
a position such that we had a person that could
be leveraged. And I'm using all these big corporate
terms, right? Basically a person that is a resource
for both young hams and old hams alike and people
who want to help. get youth involved in ham radio
and bring the demographic of amateur radio downwards
in age and at the same time to help out youngsters
who are looking for people in their peer group
or looking for ways to get more involved and
to also feedback that information to the IRA
you and its member societies and those are members
member societies or things organizations for
example like the a double RL or the radio amateurs
of Canadian Canada or the The FMRE, which is
the, I'll butcher the pronunciation, but essentially
the Mexican Amateur Radio League. They're the
formal amateur radio associations of each of
the countries in the whole region. I'm kind of
the you I don't want to call it a youth coordinator
because it's such a Overused term, but I'm a
liaison. I'm a connector I'm a facilitator and
liaison just seemed to like to be like the the
corporate term that kind of fit the best So what
do I do I? I do a variety of things. I put together
this meeting, we started actually almost a year
ago, December 30th, we started meetings to connect
the entirety of Region 2, both in Spanish, we
did some Portuguese, we had, and in English,
on Zoom, to talk with hams young and old, and
in the middle, all across the region to see what
was going on, and to feel the pulse of youth
in amateur radio. throughout the entire region.
Because right now, us in the United States, we
kind of have a good feel. We know we have Young
Amateurs Radio Club. We have Yacht. We have Young
Ham of the Year. You might be familiar with Bears,
or not Bears, Bark Jr. from Past ago ham radio
world Yeah in Boulder. There's a variety of clubs
around and I've always said this they're always
been fragmented and one of my one of my goals
was to try to coalesce and connect all of these
disparate and fragmented groups together. And
I think if I didn't mention Yacht, I shouldn't
mention Yacht. The Young Amateurs Communications
Ham team. They're great too. But anyway, what
about South America? What about Mexico? What's
going on in the Caribbean and Canada? Like what's
going on all over the place? We want to connect
those together too, so that we can facilitate
communication. and fraternity and friendship
across nations. And that's kind of the goal of
Ham Radio in the beginning, right? Is this international
goodwill piece, right? And doing that with the
youth of amateur radio, it fits so many... purposes,
not only for amateur radio, but for the youth
in general, you know, getting them off the streets,
getting them off of drugs and that sort of thing,
right? If we're thinking like that, but also
like as a good sandbox for science, tech, engineering,
math, arts, whatever you want to call it, STEAM,
STEM, whatever, and just being a fun thing to
do. So that's... In a nutshell, my ramblings
of what my role is. I really don't do that much.
I go by every two weeks I have this meeting and
I'm like, well, what have I done this last two
weeks? Oh, I should probably do something. I
send out a bunch of emails. It's pretty much
all I really do. if I'm being honest, but I facilitate
the meetings. I email and I connect the head
haunches, the leaderships of large amateur radio
organizations all the way from the ARRL to the
IREU. youth in amateur radio in mind. I always
poke at the sides of people like right now, Dave
Minster, like the CEO of ARRL, our section management,
our youth coordination, as well as the sides
of other member societies that are willing to
speak English, because my Espanol is muy, muy
malo, as you can tell, hopefully. And so that
we keep ourselves aware that, you know, we, in
the words of Frank Howell, K4FMH, are facing
kind of a demographic cliff. You go to a ham
fest, you see a lot of, like a sea of gray hair,
of graying hair or no hair. And so there's a
lot of data that shows from contests, from surveys,
from informal surveys and formal surveys, that
there's not a lot of youth out there. And there
are quite a bit. I mean, Has a thousand members
from all over the world mostly the United States
But you know, we're trying our best to increase
those numbers and to do that. We've got to really
Like do as much as we can in as many places as
possible And so getting that word out is as broadly
as possible is kind of my goal if you will so
All right. I'll shut up very good Yeah, I was
just gonna ask you, you know, okay. What is the
goal here? But I think you've done a pretty good
job of explaining that. You know, the group allows
us to communicate a little bit more about the
camp directly, about Yoda Month. In fact, Yoda
Month, instead of just being two or three countries
now, we added El Salvador today. Well, that may
not be official yet, but... The license is there,
the approval's there. We just need to make sure
the registration form's filled out. But, you
know, if it's not official it will be tomorrow.
You know, we've got El Salvador. We've got Argentina.
We've got Peru. We've got Cuba even just jumped
in we hadn't even talked to them and then Canada
has two call signs now Where we had one two years
ago and last year we didn't end up with any so
You know, it's definitely helped spread the word
about Yoda month. We've been able to help people
get their call signs and get them registered
and that kind of thing. But it also has kind
of inspired a information sharing, some ideas
of some activities to do with people. And so
that's been really cool to see. So let's talk
a little bit about uh... you know what you've
accomplished what the group is accomplished uh...
in the last year and and spread this yoda idea
uh... throughout the americas So besides Yoda
month and I think Yoda month is a great accomplishment
to have all this coordinated all this coordinated
activity To get Yoda call signs and youth on
the air But for example Aldo oh a I think it's
oh a for Oscar Alpha for Delta Papa Mike in Panama
he he Just one example, there's several like
this, and I'll probably pick on the Canadians
too, because they have really great programs.
They have started a program using FRS radios
that Yasme has donated to them to train youngsters
in the art of radio, essentially giving them
handheld radios to experiment with and do different
tasks with. Fuzzy on the details because I wrote
it down and then forgot somewhere. But essentially,
a little stepping stone, a legal stepping stone,
in getting them interested, at least educated,
about the art and science of wireless communication
and definitely doing something to Uh, let's see,
what's the, what's the word? Everyone see, you
know, however, we take for granted communications,
radio communications in general, because everyone
has a cell phone. Same might not be so true for,
for a lot of South America with huge socioeconomic
disparity and differences, but still now it's
2021, almost literally everyone has some sort
of cell phone, but you still don't know what
goes on. That's kind of the goal there is to.
educate young people on how radio works. That's
a huge industry, a huge electrical engineering
industry that can bring the said, you know, youngster
a lot of, you know, interesting career paths,
if you will. And that even goes back to, like,
the reasoning why amateur radio is protected,
space, spectrum, and all of that stuff to increase
the technical base of people, you know. to improve
electrical engineering in general, but I digress.
So there's one thing. Another thing is the other
Yoda camps are starting to brew up. For example,
in LU land, Lucas, L -U -2, LU -1, F -A -M, Lima
Uniform -1, Foxtrot, Alpha Mike, Lucas is coordinating
a youth camp in Argentina. It's a weekend camp,
so like, you know how we have this week -long
camp, very much like the youngsters on the air
in region one, you don't have to do a whole long
week -long camp. That's a lot of work, but you
can definitely do a weekend camp. It's a lot
easier. It's much easier to plan for. It's much
easier to get a whole bunch of youngsters into
it. and cheaper as well. So they're doing that
in their summer, which is of 2022, which I guess
is now December, between December and April,
I forget exactly when it is. I haven't talked
to him in the last couple meetings. I don't know
where he's been, but they are having that. And
then Canada, of course, I know three or four
different things and they're doing a lot of stuff
with scouting. Jason Tremblay, I forget his call
sign, but he's working with universities to put
together other, what was it, basically another
type of radio camp called, I have notes from
last night's meeting but I... it flew out of
my head but basically there's all these little
projects that have started up through these meetings
we've been having these ideas of like how can
we get young people educated about ham radio
interested in it and with the idea that you know
we're not going to get them licensed right now
we're not going to get them as a contest or learning
worse code or whatever we are going to seed their
mind we are maybe going to get them to do those
things later on in life who knows but the um
the goal here is, you know, education of technology,
science, engineering, math, with the amateur
radio sprinkle, if you will. I think that's what
everyone has been seeing there. And I've been
also working with some of the educators. Steve
Goodgame, K -5 ATA, invited me to his A -W -R
-L education groups .io. And as a youth liaison,
I'm a perfect I'm in a perfect place to see what's
going on in terms of what educators are doing
in the United States, for example. And there's
a lot of great things being done there, as you,
for example, you're an educator, so you should
know. So that's a couple of the things. That's
a couple of the things. I mean, and the irony
is that these meetings haven't really been with
Young people like there's a few young people
like under the age of say 20 25 actually join.
These meetings are predominantly middle -aged,
older, you know, my age or above. I'm 30, so
I'm usually the youngest with a few rare exceptions.
My intention with those meetings is to inform
everyone out there that, hey, there's this problem,
let's try to fix it. Or not even really present
it as a problem, but as a challenge, if you will.
So to try to get more young people involved with
ham radio and whatnot. So if someone is a youth
coordinator, works with youth, whatever you want
to call it, should they be attending these meetings?
And if so, how do they do that? Tell everybody
a little bit about participation. Yeah, absolutely.
If you are an educator, if you are interested
in amateur radio and Perhaps like exuding the
spirit of amateur radio to to to a younger generation
Even you don't have to be an educator. You don't
have to be anybody You can be any I'm a I'm just
a random guy off the street if you will who's
into the ham radio But I'm just interested in
sharing the passion People who are you know experts
at that who have good ideas or who have had good
ideas in the past are really really I mean court
super cordially invited because what we want
to do is share and amplify those ideas across
And share them broadly so that you know these
good ideas can be made Made available made public
so that they can be replicated if they're really
you know that great So and so that we can share
our methods of producing Yoda camps and and if
you're interested in running like a Yoda camp
or Yoda camp light like a weekend event. Honestly,
everyone's more than welcome. In fact, it's already
been recorded. All the episodes were recorded
and posted to YouTube, and there's a podcast
feed. But if you wanna... get an invite just
hit me up sterling at n0ssc .com or I don't know
I have 50 emails but that's probably the best
one if you google me you'll know how to find
me but we'll send out some links with the I guess
show notes and everyone's more than welcome all
right well we're going to take a break it's time
to do that But we'll come back and talk some
more with Sterling and take your phone calls
and questions and all that sort of thing and
we'll talk a little bit more about about youth
right after this word from Tower Electronics
right here on HamTalk Live. Is this getting serious?
I think so. Well, how do you feel about it? Just
imagine if you hadn't run out of PL -259s. Just
imagine if your connectors weren't from Tower
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Tower Electronics, the hams dime store since
1978. Join the conversation. Give us a call at
859 -982 -7373. Again, the number to call is
859 -982 -7373. Or, if you'd rather type than
talk, tweet us at HamTalk Live. Now, here's Neil
Rapp with more HamTalk Live. Here's the snap
rap takes the rig he breaks through the pile
up he's on 80 now 40 now 20 15 10 2 meters touchdown
ham talk live Welcome back to ham talk live We're
on the air every Thursday night at 9 p .m. Eastern
Time right here at hamshawklive .com and be sure
to check us out on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Tower Electronics, they're going to be on the
HamFest trail here again in January. The 8th
will be in Orlando, Florida at JackFest. Fort
Myers Florida January 21st and 22nd at Arcadia
Florida January 29th, but you can visit them
at PL -259 .com from anywhere you have internet.
So before we get back to Sterling, it's that
time once again. for the N9GSU Ham Radio Joke
of the Week. Now it's time for the HamTalk Live
Ham Radio Joke of the Week, the part of the show
where Rick tells us a ham radio joke. The HamTalk
Live Ham Radio Joke of the Week is brought to
you by QRM Labs. Now here's Rick Garrett, N9GSU,
with today's HamTalk Live Joke of the Week. I
had a fellow ham come over to install a beam
on top of my hundred foot tower. He refused to
wear a climbing belt or safety harness. He obviously
doesn't understand the gravity of the situation.
Now now Sterling left his video on so I could
I could see his expression when that When the
punchline came up and yeah, it was the I probably
have the same one every time just like I saw
that coming. Oh My goodness, all right. Well,
it's time for your call. So if you have a question,
give us a call right now And the number to call
is 859 -982 -7373. One more time on that number
is 859 -982 -7373. Or you can tweet us. It's
at HamTalk Live over on Twitter. And if you're
on Spreaker and you have an account, you can
type in the comments. But if you're listening
to us on WTWW or on the podcast edition of the
show, you won't be able to reach us live Since
we're doing this on Thursday night All right.
Well, let's get back to it here and we'll check
and see if we have anybody listening live tonight
We know we'll have plenty listening after the
show is over but we'll see if we have anything
but You know, let's talk a little bit about what
you see in the future of these meetings and what
we're kind of hoping to accomplish here in the
next year, since it's almost the next year. It
is very close. So we're going to take a break
from the next meeting. We do these meetings every
two weeks, so they're not too crazy. And I honestly
wish there were more. I think one of the initiatives
I tried to do is try to spark an interest to
have more people do more meetings. And meetings,
everyone has gotten Zoom fatigue in the world
of COVID. And so meetings are probably not the
way to go. But still, we've got to have meetings
to have communication. You've got to bring people
into a place to like... You know share ideas
and there are a variety ways to do that so i've
made a variety ways to do that. There are we
have a groups i oh we have a google like a group
like we have putting together like a workspace
like for youth on the air .org there's a discord
chat i mean there's a whole community of of hams
like the campers on telegram and all that stuff
so my goals and intentions is to. do what I whatever
I can to spark as much like online interest and
an activity and if it's not online I want to
like put together whatever I can on the air like
nuts or Reflectors, I actually put together my
pi -star last night. I stayed up till probably
1 30 1 40 a .m. Trying to figure out how to get
DMR or Yesu system fusion to push to DMR so I
could listen to like the Worldwide DMR over Yesu.
It was it was crazy. I don't know why they make
it so hard and the instructions that come with
it or there there are none but I don't know,
just find as many ways to connect everyone involved
who wants to as easily as possible. And as the
meetings go, if I could find a replacement who
can speak fluent Spanish, that would be super,
because I am really flaky. My Spanish is, again,
muy malo. And I'm never like, just like my CW,
I'm probably never going to get around to improving
it. So if you're out there and you're really
jazzed about sharing passions and getting people
involved with inspiring the next generation of
amateur radio, right? You would be a great candidate
for doing very little work, honestly. I just
turn on the Zoom meeting, say a few things, put
together a little agenda, and we go around the
room, talk about our projects, we spin up some
ideas, write it all down, record it, post it,
and then we wait two weeks to do it all over
again. There's a lot of, not a lot, there's a
little bit of like trying to keep people involved.
For example, at one meeting we had like 50, 30
or 50 people because we had a lot of really good
like outreach through ham fest and through things
like rat pack and and what's the couple of Canadians
and and people like the Friday meetings that
do I forget not Friday Saturday meetings on zoom
one of the things cycle 25 Yeah, Cycle 25. They
had some people come in. We had tons of people,
and they all kind of fizzled down to the same
six, seven regulars, if you will. So I had to
send out emails saying, hey, come back. It won't
hurt if you just join us for a few minutes, just
so we can see how you're doing. And a lot of
times, I send those emails out in Spanish, and
that helps. But yeah, finding somebody who can...
who can do that, or even lead meetings entirely
in Spanish. That's one of the things we try to
do. And that would be really cool because a lot,
a lot of the region too is Spanish speaking.
And that's a huge challenge. There's a huge language
barrier throughout, especially if you're looking
at Brazil. Brazil has a lot of hams and it's
all Portuguese. And that language is way out
there in terms of being able to speak from English
to Portuguese and even Spanish to Portuguese.
It's close but not quite. That's the, I think
the plan for the meetings. They're still gonna
keep, we're gonna meet yet again on January 12th,
so put that in your calendars. They occur at
0100 Zulu. on, I guess, Thursdays in UTC, but
it's Wednesdays. My time would be 8 a .m., or
8 p .m. Central Time on Wednesdays, so that would
be January 12th. So if you don't hear from me,
and if you email me, just find another way to
contact me. It won't be, I promise I'll answer
in some way, shape, or form. But yeah, what else
are we gonna do? I wanna try to do some kind
of like, more media outlets like podcast or youtube
or something or twitch or like have people have
young people like actually share their interest
in their activity in the hobby um there are a
lot of like i said a lot of young people doing
things in amateur radio and there are also a
lot of young people on youtube and twitch and
the the world of streaming video on the internet
and audio like here we are um and so i'm trying
to seek out ways to to to do that to capitalize,
if you will, on that. So I think that would be
really, really helpful. And I also want to, like,
build partnerships with our member societies.
So, like, AWRL, when it comes to youth, we...
pretty much only see things like the scholarships.
They have a youth coordination system in their
section, in their field organization, but there's
no reporting, there's no like, I don't know,
not many people on the outside know what's going
on and you have to really dig. and know the right
people to know what they're doing and how they're
meeting and what the ins and outs of that are,
and to have a good feeling of like, do they all
have youth and amateur radio in the back of their
minds with the other 50 million things going
on? Which is totally understandable, but building
relationships with... member societies like AWRL,
RIC. One really good example is how IOTA in region
one has relationships with RSGB in Great Britain,
the OARC in Austria, the DARC in Germany. Those
are some amazing relationships that they have.
I mean, they have really good resources. All
of those member societies have really good resources
for young people and they're good. The relationships
have been really great. So we're modeling, basically,
that too and modeling what we can from them.
All right the phone number once again 859 -982
-7373 if you would like to give us a call. Now
is the time to do that because we're going to
be Finishing things up here. And yeah, I the
only reason I thought of cycle 25 was I just
saw Rod VA 30 in Had just liked the tweet so
Great to great to see you but yeah, I've been
in on on the one of the cycle 25 meetings and
it's it's a pretty good good deal, so It's kind
of bringing Clubs to places that don't have clubs
and also, you know involving a lot of the youth
that he works with on There so that's a that's
a cool thing Well before we go, you know, which
we've talked about what's going on with with
with Yoda here in I are you region too? We will
at least mention a few the the other things going
on. We mentioned Yoda month Um, and then, um,
you know, we're planning the next region to wide
Yoda camp and hopefully COVID will allow us to
make that truly across region two instead of
just the U S. But those plans are finalizing
now. Very close. Those dates will be announced
soon and the location. And then the process of
bidding for the next camp will be coming up.
So it's not going to stay in the same place all
the time. We're going to move it around. So that
will be coming up as well. Just just a minute
or two here about the excitement for this summer.
Oh, just looking back at what we did last summer.
Oh my gosh, like the one of the one of the people
who really like his comments like come out to
me is Adam KD9KAS like the words life -changing
and and amazing and and i think taylor also mentioned
life -changing ruth i think a lot of anybody
who got on like the horn or got on like a like
a video call or an interview said something about
how it was life -changing and it brings a tear
to my eye how how like how That can happen. I
mean, it's it's bringing a bunch of young people
who have a common interest in amateur radio Together
for a week to share their interest in amateur
radio and share their knowledge of their little
little expertise like Little cell of expertise
with other people who might not have that in
a structured and in also somewhat unstructured
way, which is like super great. I'm, we're just
building on that and we're getting better. And
this year we're doing even more to make those
young people do more of the work, much to my
and Neil's pleasure, you know, so that we don't
have to do all of that work. And, and I think
that's going to be even more successful. We might
not have any idea like why they would be doing
the things that they're doing and the way that
they're doing, but that's because we're this
generation. and they are that generation, and
that's just the way that humans generation. So
I'm excited to see how it evolves in that short
time span. And then. as we move forward even
into like 2023 like this bidding thing and going
international too like COVID goodbye COVID get
out of here we won't miss you please leave right
by by the camp hopefully we can have a lot of
international guests for 2022 but by 2023 Maybe
we'll get some bids from like other countries
like Canada, Mexico, looking at you especially
in South America. Caribbean, like what about
Yoda camp in Jamaica? Or you know, the Azores,
or wait, the Azores is our region, never mind.
Wrong region. Anyway, they're just as beautiful
as other places. Trinidad and Tobago, whatever.
The opportunities are endless, and it doesn't
have to be this one single camp. It can expand
to any number. I mean, sub -regional camps are
a thing in Region 1, and so I think that's a
great thing we can do here as well. Region 3,
too, I mean, I've seen some really great things
happening in Yota, Japan with the Japanese government,
like some, I'm just reading, trying to read.
put together thoughts at the same time but there's
actually like a like a partnership working together
and there's this whole shaping the future thing
and and so everything is kind of all coming together
to to really shape a new generation of amateur
radio and and yoda is a really strong part of
it and yoda camp next year is is is that is right
there in the middle of it so i'm i'm pumped i'm
pumped i'm i'm excited i'm i am too and you know
it yes we do need you know The young people to
take over some of our work, but more importantly
It will you know, if that's the that's the big
challenge this year is to get The youth Learning
how to run things and how to do things so that
this will perpetuate itself And I think that's
the big thing with this is it's not you know
Sterling or I or Sam or Jocelyn or Andy Tony
whoever You know doing this, you know for the
rest of our lives We're probably going to have
some association to it at some level all of our
lives Because we're all so passionate about it.
But but what's more important is that you know,
the youth are running it and the youth perpetuate
this thing and and so that's going to be kind
of the the number one priority this year Is to
make that happen. So that's that's going to be
the The next challenge but yeah, I will say that's
what no and that's what the understanding that
young people are super busy I mean looking at
Bryant rascal KG5 HVO is a super busy kid who's
a rock star ham radio operator a CW operator
also rock star baseball player also rock star
do whatever else he does. Like, you know, he's
a great academic. And everyone like Ruth came
for LAO. And I can pick on everyone and say like,
oh, they're doing a million other things because,
you know, youth in AMRADIO often have like a
thousand things going on. And so you have to
take that into consideration too. Like, how can
we make it so that it's easy for them, for young
people to establish like good planning, you know,
and that. kind of like structure and foundation
to make this perpetuate, you know, and it's not
to, we're not precluding like the older generation
and middle -aged, we're not being ages or anything,
right? But, you know, because for example, when
we work with member societies and the bidding
thing, like we will have coordination and stuff
with said member societies and whatnot, but the
young people are putting like the formats together,
the meat, the... What do you call them? The workshops,
the schedules, the what are we doing, where are
we going, like we want to go there, we want to
do that, you know. Well, the old guys can figure
out all the logistics and hard stuff, right?
Yep, yep. That's what we do. Well, I'm really
pumped. I know tomorrow, I don't want to steal
his thunder, but a friend of mine is coming tomorrow
to to do an episode of his new YouTube channel.
And he's going, we're going to be doing an interview
about Yota Camp from last year. So once he's
got that done and published, we'll promote it
here on HamTalk Live. uh... we've got that coming
up tomorrow and and uh... actually signing some
papers tomorrow so uh... for some of the camp
stuff so we're we're excited to uh... to get
that going again uh... this summer and uh...
again hopefully uh... you know we we definitely
have the international interest hopefully uh...
we'll be able to uh... get some of those people
over here for yoda camp some That's that's some
exciting stuff that's coming and and you know
you mentioned you know that you know you could.
Just amazed at all all the things and you just
sit back and see what happened last summer and
just be an amazement I've been working on the
video for the booth. uh... for yoda there that
will be at uh... first at winter fest in saint
louis and then uh... and orlando hamcation and
so i'm going back through these these highlight
videos and and and i'd told julie the other night
i said you know i can sit here all night and
watch these over and over and over again and
she's like yes but you need to go to sleep at
some point. So, you know, I was like, well, I
got to check these and make sure that the repeat
cycle works, you know, for the booth. And so
I got through all of them once. And once it started
repeating, I shut it off. But every once in a
while, I have to pull them up and watch them
again, because it was just a fabulous week. And
so much for the next one. All right, Sterling,
well, we've filled our time here. So I want to
thank you for coming on and talking about all
this stuff. And again, give out the information
there on if someone is interested in getting
involved, how they can do that. Youth on the
Air dot o -r -g is our main website. You can
contact me or Neil there. And my personal email
is sterling at n0ssc .com if you want to get
an invite to the those bi -weekly Yoda region
2 meetings feel free to reach out either one
and one or two of those ways so Yeah, that's
that's how you do it All right, very good. Well
sterling. Thanks for your time tonight. I know
you're you're one of those busy people too, so
I appreciate you taking the time out to come
on and talk about all this. So thanks. Yep. I
appreciate to, I mean, I'm busy, but somebody
says, Hey, can you talk about youth in the amateur
radio on a podcast thing? And I'm like, I will
knock everything off the calendar to do just
that. I'm more than happy to. So thank you. Thank
you, Neil. Yep. All right. Well, that is a wrap
for this week's edition of Am Talk Live. Thanks
to my guest, Sterling Mann, in Zero SSC and everybody
out there in cyberspace for listening and typing
in tonight. And I'm going to take next week off
for Christmas. So let me wish you a very Merry
Christmas and invite you back Thursday night,
December 30th. at 9 p .m. Eastern Time and for
a list of our upcoming guests visit HamTalkLive
.com and if you like the show please leave us
a review on iTunes or wherever you listen that
will help other people find the show faster so
for now this is Neil Rapp WB9VPG saying 7375
and may the good DX be yours When you came right
back to my CQ call Your readability five and
strength nine You never once mentioned your weather
at all And I didn't mention mine