"Bill Sohl" wrote in message
nk.net...

"Dee D. Flint" wrote in message
...

"Carl R. Stevenson" wrote in message
...

"Mike Coslo" wrote in message
...
Carl R. Stevenson wrote:

The power limits make sense.

Do you support not teaching newcomers about RF safety? I believe
they
should be, and as long as they know the fundamentals, they should
have
the same power privileges as the rest of us.

I'll say right out that not teaching new people the fundamentals of
RF
and electrical safety is not very responsible.

The power limit is about RF exposure and the need to do the
evaluations.
This is something that I think can reasonably be considered beyond the
"beginner" level, as it requires a foundation in a number of areas.

We can't expect the newcomer to learn EVERYTHING before then
can get on the air ... compare the Novice tests of years past with
their
small number of questions and study guides with a dozen or less pages
to "Now You're Talking," which contains 200-some pages and it's clear
that "the bar" for entry has increased greatly from the entry level
tests
that
I and many others took those many years ago ... the proposal is not a
"dumbing down" for the entry level ... it's an attempt to rationalize
beginner level tests and beginner level privileges, while providing an
incentive
(gee, I hate to use that word, since the incentive used to be keyed to
Morse
proficiency more than anything else) to learn and advance.

[snipped the rest where we seem to be in fundamental agreement]

The real oddity is how this situation came about. Once the no-code
technician license was introduced, people chose to take the route of
studying the 200 page book to get the no-code tech license rather than
the
much simpler Novice written and simple 5wpm test. It was the beginners
themselves who changed the Tech to a beginner license by choosing to
bypass
the Novice. People are strange.
Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

They didn't bypass Novice since they had to pass the written before
2000. The testing to get to tech was divided into two written elements.
What many bypassed was the code test. If Novice was nocode with
VHF access, especially to 2m, I'd bet there wouldn't have been anywhere
near the number of techs we have today.

Cheers,
Bill K2UNK


I said they elected to use the no-code Technician as their entry to ham
radio rather than the Novice license. Yes they took the Novice written but
not the code. Thus they "bypassed" the Novice license in the sense that
they never held a Novice license. They had basically two choices to enter
ham radio (unless of course they chose to do additional study and sit for
higher class tests at the same time).

1) They could take (and pass) the Novice written plus 5wpm and get a Novice
license.
2) They could take (and pass) the Novice written and Tech written and get a
no-code Tech license.

The prospective ham generally took the route 2 to enter ham radio rather
than route 1. Thus by that choice, the people themselves made the Tech
no-code the entry level license despite the fact that it was more difficult
than earning the Novice license. The restructuring in 2000 merely
formalized what had already occurred.

Having earned my initial license in 1992 (Tech with HF), I'm quite familiar
with what was going on. The majority of people sitting for their first
license took the Tech no-code route to put off learning the code not because
of its two meter and VHF access. Prior to on-air experience, they simply
were not personally familiar enough with various ham activities to select
their entry route on the basis of the desireability of having 2m access.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE