A Brief History of the Volunteer Examiner Program
Except for Novice class license exams, all amateur radio license examinations were directly supervised by Federal communications commission (FCC) personnel at FCC offices around the country. In many large cities amateur testing was conducted on a weekly schedule at FCC offices. The FCC also sent examiners to cities where field-office testing was not conveniently available. Depending on the FCC's schedule, such testing occurred every three, six or even 12 months.
In the early 1980's, the US government was forced to cut back on the budgets of many of its agencies and the FCC was not overlooked. With less money to operate, the FCC was forced to "tighten its belt" and as a result, testing schedules at field offices were significantly cut back and the field-office visits were eliminated. Shortly thereafter, the FCC announced that it was going to get out of the amateur exam business altogether.
In late 1982, President Reagan signed into law the Goldwater-Wirth bill (also known as Public Law 97-259) which amended the Communications Act of 1934, permitting the FCC to accept the voluntary and uncompensated services of licensed radio amateurs to serve in preparing and administering amateur radio license exams. The bill also gave birth to the Volunteer Examiner Coordinator (VEC) program.
At the 1983 Dayton Hamvention, FCC examiners supervised Volunteer Examiners who administered tests to more than 600 applicants. This successful demonstration of volunteer testing opened the door for the formation of VECs in early 1984 and the subsequent development of the VE program as we know it today.
A series of intermediate steps followed, which were concerned with how the examinations were to be developed, who would prepare the questions to be used, how the country would be divided into different regions so that paperwork could be routed more efficiently, and so on. Ultimately, 13 examination districts were created. One of the questions that arose was the one of how to handle the expenses involved in preparing, distributing, and administering the various exams. Another was who would certify the necessary volunteer examiners.
Once these and other procedural questions were resolved, a two-tier arrangement was implemented. A relatively small number of VECs (Volunteer Examiner Coordinators) were be chosen (thirteen), and each of these would interface between the FCC and individual examiners, who became known as VEs (Volunteer Examiners). Thus, the FCC only needed to deal with a few separate organizations, rather than hundreds (or thousands) of individual examiners. Today, there are 14 VECs who administer thousands of amateur radio license exams each year using their network of certified VEs.In late 1983, congress passed a bill that provided specifically for recouping necessary expenses in the VE Program. In 1984, the FCC began certifying organizations to coordinate the efforts of the volunteer examiners. The first VEC to be certified was the the Anchorage (Alaska) Amateur Radio Club.
On Saturday, May 12th, 1990 the Anne Arundel Radio Club (AARC) under the guidance of Nancy Alley (NT3Z) and Dean Alley (NS3V) conducted it's first license exam session as part of the Volunteer Examiner (VE) Program of the Laurel VEC. It proved to be so successful that the Board of Directors voted to hold one on the second Saturday of each month. The Anne Arundel Radio Club (AARC) has been affiliated with the Laurel VEC ever since.