School Club Roundup
| School Club Roundup | |
|---|---|
| Sponsors | ARRL and the Long Island Mobile Amateur Radio Club (LIMARC) |
| February event | Second full school week of February |
| October event | Third full school week of October |
| Event period | 1300 UTC Monday to 2359 UTC Friday |
| Rules in brief | |
| Operating limit | 6 hours in any 24-hour period; 24 hours in all |
| Exchange | Call sign, signal report, class (I, C or S), and state, province or country |
| Bands | All amateur bands except 60, 30, 17 and 12 meters |
| Modes | Phone, CW and digital |
| Dates | |
| 2026 | February 9–13 and October 19–23 |
| Entries due | 15 days after the event ends |
The School Club Roundup (SCR) is a twice-yearly operating event, sponsored by the ARRL and the Long Island Mobile Amateur Radio Club (LIMARC) of New York, that encourages contacts with amateur radio stations at schools.[1] School stations from elementary schools to universities spend a week on the air, while other clubs and individual hams try to work as many of them as possible. The event runs for five weekdays, Monday to Friday, so that students can operate during the school week, and it has its own certificate categories for each level of school. This article follows the rules posted by the ARRL for the 2026 events.
When and who
SCR is held in the second full school week of February and the third full school week of October.[2] Each event runs from 1300 UTC Monday to 2359 UTC Friday, a total of 107 hours, but no station may operate for more than 6 hours in any 24-hour period or more than 24 hours in all.[2] Clearly marked breaks of at least 10 minutes do not count as operating time.[2]
Entrants choose one of three classes:
- I, an individual, single-operator station that is not a club;
- C, a club or multioperator group that is not a school;
- S, a school club or group, from kindergarten through high school or at a college or university.[2]
A multioperator station must use one call sign for the whole event and may have only one transmitter on the air at a time.[2] Hams anywhere may take part, and stations outside the United States are listed separately in the results.[2] See Amateur radio in schools and Collegiate amateur radio for how school stations are set up.
Exchange and scoring
The exchange is the call sign, a signal report, the class (I, C or S) and the station's US state, Canadian province or territory, or DXCC entity. The full exchange must be sent and received over the air, and digital modes count only if they can carry all of it.[2] Each station may be worked once per band and mode.
A phone contact is worth one point and a CW or digital contact two points.[2] The multiplier is the number of states, provinces and territories and DXCC entities worked, plus two for each club worked and five for each school worked.[2] Alaska and Hawaii count as states, while Puerto Rico and other US possessions count as DX.[2] The score is contact points times the multiplier, so the schools themselves are by far the most valuable contacts.
Bands and modes
All amateur bands are allowed except 60, 30, 17 and 12 meters.[2] Phone, CW and digital modes such as RTTY and PSK all count. Repeaters may not be used, and on VHF and UHF only recognized simplex frequencies are allowed, except the US national calling frequency of 146.52 MHz (and calling frequencies elsewhere); satellite contacts and real-time digital contacts do count.[2] The ARRL publishes suggested HF frequencies for phone and CW.
Entries and history
Entries must be submitted or postmarked within 15 days of the end of the event; for the October 2026 event, held October 19–23, entries are due by 2359 UTC on November 7.[3] The preferred way to enter is the ARRL's online score submission page. Logs in the Cabrillo format, which most logging software creates, are recommended, and paper entries are still accepted by mail to LIMARC.[2] Certificates go to the top stations in four school categories, elementary, middle or junior high, senior high, and college or university, and to non-school clubs, multioperator groups and individuals.[2]
SCR is run jointly by LIMARC and the ARRL, with LIMARC answering questions and receiving mailed entries. The ARRL's results pages have most sessions since October 2009, with full online results from October 2013.[2] Like many events, SCR lost entries during the COVID-19 pandemic and then recovered: the ARRL reported 68 entries for October 2022 and 96 for February 2023, a total exceeded in only two earlier February sessions.[1]
See also
References
External links
- School Club Roundup, ARRL
- October School Club Roundup, ARRL contest portal
- LIMARC, Long Island Mobile Amateur Radio Club