Amateur numbers grow and so does the membership of the clubs and the WIA

July was a big month for producing new Radio Amateurs. The WIA examination service processed 90 foundation licence assessment, 84 of the 90 passed, 23 standard assessment and 22 of the 23 passed and 6 advanced assessments, 3 of them passed.

Around 70% of the standard and advanced grade assessments where upgrades from the foundation licence and combined this gave us just over 90 new amateurs for the month. The WIA examination service has processed 870 successful foundation licence assessments since the first examination in late October. There now seems little doubt that the WIA examination service will process more than 1000 successful candidates in the first full year of assessing foundation licence candidates. It is now also apparent that an increasing number of people are upgrading from foundation to standard and advanced and feedback from assessors and several clubs offering training confirms this trend will continue to accelerate over the coming months.

Feedback from a growing number of clubs indicates that club membership and meeting attendance is growing also. July was a record month for the National WIA, we admitted 77 new members for the month and if this trend continues the WIA membership will pass 4000 at around the same time as we see 1000 foundation licensees reached.

Since the inception of the National WIA in May 2004 amateur numbers have grown by around 4% and WIA membership by 14%.

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