FCC Technician Licensing- NOT!
I totally disagree that we should depend on the FCC to require technicians
to be licensed.
The FCC license never was a demonstration of competence. Everyone who is
honest will admit that, even those of us who had First Class licenses at one
time.
By eliminating the requirement to have a worthless FCC license, the FCC
forced the industry to demonstrate how valuable up-front competence was in
the hiring process. They have, and apparently, it isn’t.
Today’s pitiful level of competence in the industry’s technicians is NOT the
FCC’s fault. The FCC never assured that anyway. It is the fault of those who
hire. Most don’t want to pay the salary that would be demanded by those who
might actually bother to learn.
Given the fact that very few educational opportunities exit to learn this
business, it is no wonder that young tech types end up in the hundreds of
networking schools found everywhere.
It is way past time for the LMR industry to accept responsibility for its
own problems and stop whining about the FCC.
Once all the radio systems are IP based, those networking certified young
techs will be managing them anyway, and the old “radio techs” will be
retired and can sit around all day moaning about the FCC.
I could be wrong, but I’m not.
