Wireless, STEM, and Radio Technology Education Project Grants is sponsored by ARRL Foundation. This grant supports educational initiatives in wireless technology, radio, and STEM. The program prioritizes youth engagement and local radio club partnerships, funding projects year-round and encouraging amateur radio education and outreach efforts.

Licensing, Education & Training Through our Education & Technology Program, ARRL offers grants for radio station equipment and related software equipment and resources for schools in the US.

The application requirements are straightforward: we look for commitment from teachers and school administration, a well conceived plan to use the resources to engage students, and a working relationship with local ham radio volunteers who will provide mentoring support for the school. Grant applicants must be a current ARRL member to be eligible to apply.

The Education & Technology Program offers two types of grants: ETP School Station Grants are awarded to schools that provide a plan to use Amateur Radio as part of an enrichment program and/or as part of in classroom learning.

ETP Progress Grant s offer modest support to those teachers who are currently using Amateur Radio in their classrooms as an instructional tool and who need additional resources for specific purposes, or for teachers who need resources to get started instructing wireless technology and electronics topics as part of a longer range plan to involve Amateur Radio.

APPLICATIONS WILL ONLY BE ACCEPTED FOR REVIEW BETWEEN OCTOBER 1ST AND OCTOBER 31ST of 2025. STEPS FOR ETP GRANT APP 2025: Step 1: Review the ETP Grant App 2025 Information Document here. Step 2: Complete the 2025 ETP Grant Application on Jotform here.

Step 3: Make sure your inbox can accept group emails from ead@arrl. org, the helpdesk of ARRL Education Department. Step 4: After successful submission of the application, please check back here for all news updates.

Selected ETP Grant recipients will be contacted by their personal emails listed in their applications within 30 days after the October 31 st grant deadline. Please contact ead@arrl. org at least 5 days before the 2025 deadline for assistance only after reviewing the Information Document.

Section 9 & 11 Downloads: Please download, edit, save changes and rename the following files before reuploading them in your JotForm application.

Excel File: Section 9 - Proposed Budget Excel Spreadsheet entitled “ETP Proposed Grant Budget 2025_Name_Callsign_School” PDF: Section 11 - Antenna Installation Approval entitled “ETP Grant Section 11_AntennaInstallationApproval_FirstLastName - Revised Oct 2025” OR refer to page 6 of the Information Doc to access this in microsoft Word. APPLICATIONS WILL ONLY BE ACCEPTED FOR REVIEW BETWEEN OCTOBER 1ST AND OCTOBER 31ST of 2025.

Where can I find funding for a specific project in school? ARRL Education & Technlogy Program Grants are available to provide equipment for school stations or other resources related to radio/ wireless technology classroom projects. F i n d mo re i n f o r ma ti o n a bo u t ETP g ra n ts .

Grants from the ARRL Foundation provide s ee d m o ne y f o r n e w i dea s. Find more information about ARRL Foundaiton Project Grants . What are some equipment suggestions for an ETP school station grant?

I hesitate to recommend a radio without seeing what is being planned. There are lists of equipment that have been granted to schools in the past, this list is available upon request, but will be provided only with the understanding that this is only a guide, your plan must take precedence. When you are looking for a radio that will be used in a school program, look for one that is easy to operate.

All radios nowadays are basically microcontroller controller controlled and will require some programming. Some manufacturers have programming paradigms that are intuitive and easy to program, others not. Some radios are attractive because they have wide frequency coverage from 160 meters to UHF; on the flip-side, they are generally more expensive and more difficult to operate.

Equipment needed for making satellite contacts is a separate discussion. If your interest is in preparing a station for an ISS contact through the ARISS program you will need to research the current ARISS recommendations to get a listing of the radio power and frequency step resolution suggestions and station configuration recommendations set by the ARISS program.

These recommendations are more elaborate than needed for a casual FM satellite contact because of the need to maximize the communication window for the assembled audience and to provide redundancy in case of unexpected equipment problems. In many instances schools rely on loaned equipment for scheduled ARISS contacts.

If I were to recommend anything about the school radio, try to keep the radio generic if you are just looking to do casual operations (School Club Roundup, contacts and rag chewing, local VHF/UHF repeater contacts), and then look for a specific radio if you are looking to do more specialized operations (satellite communications, ARISS contacts, weak signal, QRP).

If I were to set up a school station again (and I have done it a number of times over the years), I would look at a basic HF radio running around 100 watts (common, and avoid QRP radios…you will be disappointed in their performance in the classroom setting). I would add a basic 2 meter mobile radio running about 25-50 watts for VHF.

Then if the program expands to include more exotic and specialized operations, get the appropriate resource as required to accomplish those modes. Antennas are probably the most problematic part of your station. Will your school even allow you to install an antenna at the school?

What are the school district policies concerning installing equipment on the school plant? Will you be required to use a certified contractor? Is the school maintenance staff required to do all installations?

Are there community building codes that would prevent you from installing the antenna? These are just a few of the questions that you need to answer. Once you are confident that you CAN install the antenna, then you need to go back to your overall plan to see what kind of antenna will meet the needs of your plan.

As with the radios, your antenna should be simple and rugged. Many of the “high performing” antennas you see in advertisements are actually very difficult to construct and install, and once installed, many are very delicate and do not hold up to winds very well. I am not sure I would trust the advertised wind limits for some antennas.

Then you have to consider the location of the antenna and the liabilities imposed by installing an antenna on campus. I have found over the years that a roof mounted multiband vertical antenna with radials for each band laying on the roof surface is about the simplest and most rugged antenna for a school environment. What grant should I request to begin an after school program for my students?

A w ea t h e r st a t i o n i de a w ou ld b e ea sy t o i n st it u te an d y o u c a n s e e h o w m an y o t h e r t e a c he rs ju m p o n b o a rd w ith tha t e f fo rt. The e q u ipme n t w ou ld b e re q ue st e d u n de r a Pro g ress g ra n t. W ha t y o u w ou ld e x pe ct is t h e r e c e i v e r, p r e - amp , an d N O VA s o f t w a re.

Y ou ’d b e e x pe ct e d t o g e t t h e W X T O I M G (s t a rt ou t w ith t h e f r e e v e rs i on ), bu i l d t h e a n t e nna , a n d c o m e u p w ith th e c o m pu t e r. O n ce y o u g e t t h a t p ro g ram g o in g , t h e n t h ink a bou t t h e f o x h u n ti n g . Th a t e q u ipme n t (t w o o f t h e m p r o b a b l y ) w ou ld b e re q ue s t e d u n de r a Pro g ress g ra n t a l s o .

By t i m e y o u g e t t ho se pa rts o f y ou r pr o g ram g o in g , t he n f o r t h e h a n d s o n e lec t r o n ics, it w ou ld b e b e st t o g e t s up p o rt f r o m l o c a l s ou r c e s be c au se t h e s u pp l ie s a re e x pe n d a b le an d w ou ld ne e d t o b e re p lac e d e a ch y ea r.

Y o u s h o u ld c o n sid e r AR R L g ra n ts a s s e e d mo n e y tha t w i l l he lp y o u g e t g o in g , bu t s u s t a in e d s up p o rt s h ou ld b e s ou g h t f r o m o t h e r s ou rces… P T A , Site C oun ci l s, o r loc a l H a m g ro up s. T h e l a st s t e p (o r m a y b e y ou r f i r st, it d ep e nd s o n y ou r pl a n ) w ou ld b e a n E TP g ra n t f o r a f u ll u p r a d io s t a ti o n a t t h e sc h oo l.

The E T P g ra n t is a o n e t i m e o p po r t un it y . T h e Pro g ress g ra n ts c a n h ap p e n a s y ou r pr o g ram g ro w s an d c h a n g e s d i r e cti on s. What type of antenna makes the most sense for a school station?

Antenna selection and installation is about the hardest part of the school station to come up with; too many variables and too many restrictions. So each installation is unique and it would be impossible to give you a "one size fits all" recommendation. Additionally there are personal preferences based on experiences.

Some hams swear by a particular antenna that is a "must" and others would recommend something totally different. So my recommendation on the Hustler antennas must be considered through those filters and from my experiences of installing antennas at school sites personally and from what I have seen over the years as others try to set up stations in schools.

The first few things to remember is that any departure in size from the basic dipole will generally degrade the performance of an antenna... it is just physics. Most times reducing the size of an antenna is a necessary tradeoff that must be taken to get something in the air, so you have to accept the reduced performance.

In the majority of cases the reduced size antennas will work satisfactorily and give your students a great ham radio experience. The other thing to try to remember, particularly in a school environment, is to keep the installation simple. You are generally not going to have unfettered access to the antenna at the school site to tweak the antenna or make repairs and adjustments.

You also have to consider if the school will require that the antenna be installed by a professional or if the local hams will be allowed to do it. This makes a huge difference in the type of antenna you want to install. When I was in the classroom, I had a principal/superintendent who let me do anything I needed to do to install the antenna on the roof...

until the school was getting the new roof, then he was a little more restrictive. When I was the school principal, I did what I wanted because the distances involved with the district office basically made me the on-site superintendent. Okay, now on to the specifics.

In my experience, the Hygain antennas are relatively delicate and complicated to assemble, meaning they take frequent maintenance in high wind or high humidity/salt air environments. The attached radial system are shortened radials. The shortened radials are a far departure from the 1/4 wavelength radials that are most efficient to simulate the ground at the elevated location.

On the Hustler trapped verticals (6BTV I think would give you 10-80, but not the WARC bands), it is a very rugged antenna and simple use of traps. It can be ground mounted without radials but it is rare that the ground conductivity is good enough for optimum antenna performance without even ground radials buried a few inches below the grass surface. I doubt that a ground mounted vertical would be acceptable at a school location.

If the Hustlers are elevated, (and all verticals are this way) you have to attach at least 2-1/4 wave length radials for each band you want to use. The radials have to fan out around the base of the antenna. You could do this on a flat roof of a school, just have the radials lay on the roof surface with some sort of weight at the radial ends to keep them in place (small sand bags will work).

I had good results with an alternative radial scheme that is detailed by DX Engineering for their radial kit. Their scheme is to put as many 20 foot radials around the base of the antenna as you can make, like a radial curtain around the bottom laying on the roof. This works very well, but it does require retuning the traps of the antenna (not a big deal, unscrew a clamp, move the parts, check with an SWR meter, tighten the screws).

I use 20-20 foot radials on a ground mounted Hustler. I don't break pile-ups with the antenna, but when I make the kinds of contacts that I like to make (casual), I get acceptable reports... not 45 dB over 9, but S 7-9 at least...

good enough to be reliably heard. You also need to realistically look at the type of operating you expect to do. Many teachers get over enthusiastic thinking that they are going to use all the bands and chase all the DX with their students and they want a first rate antenna installation for a DX power house.

Nice, but in virtually every case, the school operation settles down to the basics, some 40 and 20 meter SSB casual contacts when the propagation gods get everything aligned, skip, bell schedules, time zone alignments etc. Because the WARC bands are not harmonics of the traditional bands (80-10 meters), antennas that cover the traditional bands and the WARC bands in one antenna tend to be very complicated, delicate, and expensive.

You will have to determine if you really will use the WARC bands. So I really didn't answer your question, because I can't. It all comes down to what you want to do, and what your school will allow you to do, and what physical limitations you face at the specific school site.

All I can recommend is that if you go to your local ham expert with all sorts of technical and operating experience for advice, take that advice and temper it with the realities you face as a classroom teacher in a restrictive school environment.

Yes we would all like to have 150 foot towers with large beams and long wire dipoles being fed by 2KW linears, to maybe bust a pile-up to hear the DX operator say "you're 59 say again call sign?" , but in most cases, simple 40/20 meter SSB stations will be about the most effective school station that supports your curriculum.

One case in point; a school just had to have a Stepper IR vertical antenna for 20 meters and above, with a solid state linear amplifier because the 1st grade students were going to "talk to the world" and gain all sorts of cultural experiences... and this is the absolute minimum station required to do the job... according to the local ham elmer.

The antenna cost over $600, we did not support the linear, the local club ended up ponying up the $6,000 to buy the linear. When I visited the school a year later, the antenna was still in the box, the linear had been used only one time because of all the interference it caused with the school IT network, and they had a home brew, single band (I think it was 20 meters) vertical pole for the antenna.

Virtually all of the schools operating with the 1st grade students was with an HT using the local repeaters. When I recommend tempering the advice, that includes the advice I give you here! Can we attain a grant for FEMA courses?

T h e F E M A c ou rses a re v e ry w e ll don e a n d v e ry w o rth w h i le no t on ly fo r y o u b u t f o r y o u r st ud e n ts. The independent study courses are free (paid for by taxpaper dollars). If you want to do more, h a v e y o u t h ou g h t a bo u t a pp r o a c h i n g th e l o c a l f i r e d istr i ct c o m m iss i on ?

M o st f i r e d istr i cts ha v e a b u d g e t l i n e t ha t g oe s to w a rd c o m m un ity ou tr e a c h . I be t t h a t i f y o u app r o a c h e d t h e m w ith th e s pe c i f ics o f y ou r r e q ue st a n d w ha t y o u a r e do i n g ( sla n t it t o w a rd g i v ing th e s tu d en ts e x po s u re t o p ub l i c s e r v ice, i. e .

, f i r e f i g h t i n g ) you will get some support. Attend the Teachers Institute! This professional development workshop will provide ideas and resources to bring wireless...

Learn More Investigate the free resources we've developed to help you instruct concepts in basic... Learn More ARRL's Education & Technology Program offers resources and training to classroom teachers. Learn More Other grant opportunities Check out grant opportunities and scholarships offered by The ARRL Foundation.

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ARRL Awards 2016 ETP Grants ARRL awarded three station equipment grants and one progress grant for the 2016-2017 school year. fix to https://home. arrl.

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