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Santa Clara County ARES®/RACES

Field Training Opportunities

SCCo ARES/RACES offers four kinds of field training opportunities.

Pop-Up-Practices

Pop-Up-Practices

Pop-Up Practices are events where you can come try out a skill, with experts on hand to help you. No pressure and no consequences; they are opportunities to try something new and experiment. Pop-up practices are offered occasionally on no set schedule.

There are no pop-up practices currently scheduled.

Drills

Drills

Drills are events focused on training a single skill, such as net control or packet operations. Participants are expected to have taken the classes for the skill, and in most cases to have the requisite equipment.

SCCo ARES/RACES hosts drills three times a year, in which many cities participate. Here are this year’s drills:

Exercises

Exercises

Exercises are events focused on the interactions between practitioners of various skills. Participants are expected to have the necessary classwork and equipment and at least some practical experience with the skills they sign up for.

SCCo ARES/RACES hosts one major exercise each year:

There are also occasional opportunities to take part in broader exercises with other emergency responders. This year we have:

Public Service Events

Public Service Events

Public Service Events are events such as parades, bike races, festivals, etc., that need communications help. These are real events and we need to serve the organizers competently. However, no drill or exercise will ever provide as much training value (or as many unexpected scenarios) as a real-world event.

Public service events are added to the calendar occasionally. Here are the upcoming ones we know about so far: