Clay Center Amateur Radio Club

CC-ARC has closed and restarted elsewhere

Jun 102018

All previous posts and archives have been removed.
As of June 2018, the Clay Center Amateur Radio Club was closed by the school administration. As a community-wide educational club with over 360 members, it served current students, alumni/ae, summer campers, and friends in the community and was seen as an amazing entity of outreach and goodwill. The administration set unreasonable and unmeetable terms to restrict the club to an existence only within the school with no chance of ever including the rest of the community again. As many of the youth leaders of the club, including many newly elected in June, had been community members who would be excluded from the club, the youth leaders with the support of adult mentors, restarted the club under a new name and in a new location. Check out Sci-Tech Amateur Radio Society (STARS) for an awesome, regional, community-based club that is all-inclusive and has the same educational mission as the former club.

Boxboro 2016 Ham Convention was amazing!

Sep 122016

The ARRL Amateur Radio Convention in Boxborough was a great success.

Twenty of our youth members attended: Kevork KB1ZAW, Marty KC1CWF, Rishi KC1BKX, Brodie KC1CZQ, Teddy KC1CZR, Nathan KB1RD, Noah K. KC1FUL, Noah M. KC1CZT, Andy KC1DAZ, Adam KC1CJP, Kenneth KC1AHI, Karin W1EVK, Zeke KC1EWB, Bennet KC1GEM, Sean K3FAY, Sofia KC1GBF, Cian KC1GBU, Alex W6AXE, Julie S. (TBD), Liam C. (TBD). Supervisors were Bob K5TEC, Ted KB1TJ, and Jeremy KB1REQ.

The Youth forum sessions were excellent, although audience attendance was better on Saturday. The flea market allowed us to sell much unused and donated equipment. We had an info booth in the main hall. The DXCC dinner Friday was interesting as David Collingham K3LP showed movies of the DX expedition to islands near Antarctica.

The Saturday banquet’s Keynote address by writer and radio historian Donna Halper was amazing! She talked about the heroes of radio past and present, highlighted some amazing females in radio history, and even referenced a number of notable hams in the audience, reminding us that we are the ones making history now. We are the future heroes.

Our Club President, Kevork KB1ZAW, talked with Donna Halper afterward and invited her to join the CC-ARC as an honorary member. She accepted and said she would love to come speak at a club meeting at any time.

Bob and Ted talked with ARRL CEO Tom Gallagher, who, as always, was in awe of our club. He wanted to know more about how we run such an awesome youth-friendly and family-friendly club. He also joined the CC-ARC as an Honorary Member!

Club member Liam Cunjak took the Technician exam Sunday at Boxboro and passed with flying colors! Later that day in the final prize drawings he won an Alinco DJ-500 dual band transceiver! Congratulations Liam!

Field Day 2016

Jun 232016

Field Day 2016 is fast approaching and we will be hosting a field day site at the campus in Brookline MA with New England Amateur Radio. We will have operations going all 24 hours during the field day operating time of 02:00p Saturday though to 02:00p Sunday. Public visitation hours will be 3p-6p Saturday and 9a-noon Sunday.

More information is at http://www.cc-arc.org/activities/field-day/

Get Ready for Field Day 2016!

Jun 082016

Field Day 2016 is fast approaching on June 25th and 26th. We are planning an exciting operating weekend filled with fun, education, and serious amateur radio.

This year we are delighted to be partnering up again with New England Amateur Radio to help facilitate our Field Day activities. They will be allowing use of their NE1AR call sign for our GOTA station.

The Field Day information for 2016 has been updated and will continue to develop as we get closer to Field Day weekend. All the details can be seeing on our Field Day main page.

Boxboro 2015 Youth Forum

Aug 222015

Six of our members were on a panel at the Boxboro 2015 convention on the first youth panel at Boxboro. Panel members include Marty, KC1CWF; Ananya, KC1DJW; Nathan, KC1CFU; Brodie, KC1CZQ; Kevork, KB1ZAW; and Jeremy, KB1REQ. The panel was moderated by Bob, K5TEC.

Youth members of the cc-arc at the Boxboro 2015 youth forum.

New Officers and Positions at 2015 Annual Meeting

Jul 192015

The 2015 Annual Meeting was held Tuesday, July 14, 6:30 pm at the Clay Center in Brookline. Sixteen active members were in attendance. Current president Nick W3BER opened the meeting. There was role call, greetings, passing of 2014 meeting minutes, reports on events of the current year, and election of officers.

We welcome new officers Kevork KB1ZAW – President, Kenneth KC1AHI – Vice President, Kripa KC1DYW – Treasurer, and returning officers Bob K5TEC – Secretary, Bruce N9JBT – Educational Advisor, and Marek KB1NCG – Technical Advisor.

The new president appointed the following non-officer positions: Science Advisor – Forrest AB1LG, Club Emergency Coordinator – Marek KB1NCG, Ham Shack Supervisor – Marty , Net Control Coordinator – Nathan KC1CFU, Club Events Coordinator – Ron KC1AHJ, Field Day Coordinator – Marek KB1 NCG, QSL Coordinator – Will K1WBE, Contest Coordinator – Jeremy KB1REQ, VE Coordinator – Marek KB1NCG, Members-at-Large – Rishi KC1BKX, Ananya KC1DJW, Noah KC1CZT, Andy KC1DAZ, Elio KC1EDC. New non-officer positions were created an appointed: Fox Hunt Coordinators – Adam KC1CJP and Will K1WBE, Outreach Coordinators – Nick W3BER and Nathan KC1CFU, Ham Shack Control Op Mentor – Bruce N9JBT.

In other business discussed, the date of the annual meeting was set in July 2016, date TBD, and it was decided that annual meetings will no longer be held at the Boxboro convention as in the past. Time for regular meetings was discussed and it was decided that we should hold a holiday gathering in December for the benefit of all the youth members away at college. A discussion of NETS and Youth NETS confirmed that the regular NET will stay on Tuesdays at 7:30 and a new state-wide Youth NET on Tuesdays at 7:30 on the MMRA repeater network will commence on July 30. There was some discussion about keeping dues at $0, about reviving the ByLaws Committee, about continuing the Youth Emergency NET that was created last winter, and about creating a collaboration between CC-ARC and NE1AR (New England Amateur Radio Inc.). The meeting adjourned at 8:00 pm.

After-School Youth Radio Club is Popular

Jun 032015

Amateur radio has been a big attraction this year with 33 students participating in this unique after-school program offered to grades 4-12. The amateur radio curriculum introduces students to many STEM concepts in digital electronics, radio propagation, and mathematics, as well as prepares them for the FCC radio Technician license exam. Many students have taken classes for the upgrade license levels, including the General license and the coveted and challenging Amateur Extra license.

First EME Experiment Draws a Crowd

Apr 302015

On Tuesday, April 28, members of the club came to see or help with our first Earth-Moon-Earth contact attempt. After weeks of preparation with several members helping assemble antennas, mount rotors, and load software, it all finally came together and worked (well, the equipment all worked, but we didn’t get a contact). We will try again on May 26. Many thanks to Marek KB1NCG, Bob K5TEC, Marty KC1CWF, and Nick W3BER for leading the way.

The attempt was hampered somewhat by the gusty winds that evening that were gusting to as high as 25 MPH. With the wind we had to add additional guy lines to buckets of water to help keep the setup stable. It handled the winds quite elegantly and the setup was overall a great success. This definitely showed off the engineering aspects of STEM within amateur radio.

Videos: Marek, KB1NCG, explains EME to the kids and others attending.
Marek, KB1NCG, working on the antenna setup.

Astronaut #12 Joins the Club!

Apr 032015

Member - Don Thomas Astronaut Donald Thomas joined the Clay Center Amateur Radio club when he met Bob K5TEC at a Space Expo in Connecticut and heard about the club. An amateur radio operator himself, Dr. Thomas, KC5FVF, was pleased to hear that so many of our youth are getting into amateur radio. He talked about how he used the radio station on board the International Space Station to talk to students on the earth.

Originally from Ohio, Dr. Thomas became an astronaut in July 1991. A veteran of four space flights, he has logged over 1,040 hours in space. He was a mission specialist on Columbia STS-65 (July 8-23, 1994), Discovery STS-70 (July 13-22, 1995), Columbia STS-83 (April 4-8, 1997) and Columbia STS-94 (July 1-17, 1997).

Dr. Thomas’ autographed portrait and his book, Orbit of Discovery, are on display at the Clay Center.

Astronaut #11 Joins the Club!

Jan 192015

Thanks to Luke W. and Frankie G. we now have another astronaut as a member of the club! Astronaut Steve Bowen was visiting Dexter Southfield on January 19th and gave a presentation to grades 3, 4, 5, and 6. Among the students in those grades were 19 amateur radio operators who posed for a picture with the astronaut. Luke and Frankie invited the astronaut to join the radio club and he accepted!

Astronaut Steve Bowen with radio students

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