There's been a big effort here to reach out to the area boy scout and girl scout clubs, not a lot of the young girls seem too interested in radio, but there always seems to be a couple of the boys that show a lot of interest. The thing that usually holds them back are the parents.....
The parential excuses are usually.....
We've already spent enough money on video games, we can't afford another expensive hobby for our son....
"OR"...that's all well and good, but I really don't want to de-value my property with a bunch of obnoxious looking antennas....
"OR"....he says he's interested now, but I just know that after we buy him all that stuff he'll loose interest, and it'll go to waste....
It seems you have to sell the parents on HAM radio first, before you can sell the child, if the parents aren't interested in promoting the hobby and investing in just a single band HT to start with, then you're just putting on a show with no return for the over all hobby.
Every once in a while you find that right combination of interested child and parents, Mom supports it, Dad gets as interested as the son, they both take the Tech test and get into it together.....
When I was a kid it was either stereo equipment, or CB radio....there weren't any home computers or video games, so you were either really into playing music, or experimenting with CB's, and that lead you into HAM.
Now days there are so many other forms of electronic entertainment available to kids, the radio hobbies have taken a back seat along with model rockets, or building models of any kind......
It's really good to hear someone making a contact with a 9 year old, and especially a YL at that.......
