when you get back

Korero (AEWS), Volume 2, Issue 13, 3 July 1944, Page 20

when you get back

POSSIBLE JOBS FOR SERVICEMEN

RADIO (INCLUDING WIRELESS OPERATORS) So many men will gave gained wartime training in some aspects of this work that it seems likely that only the fully qualified will be sure of employment after the war. Service personnel are already realizing this, and some are qualifying for their civil certificates. Radio provides several types of careers : — (1) Factory Work.— The assembling of machines and other branches of manufacture, including work on receivers and transmitters. (2) Servicing Machines.— ln order to qualify for registration as a serviceman

an examination must be passed, and the applicant for registration must have served (under a registered tradesman) for three years on radio equipment work which is of a nature satisfactory

to the Electric Wireman’s Registration Board. Personnel in the armed forces who are engaged on work of this type may have full or partial recognition given to their service.

: (3) Technical Operators in Broadcasting Stations, &c. — Matriculation is not essential, but a good standard of education and a sound knowledge of radio principles are desirable inasmuch as considerable study is required for the Technical Operator’s certificate. The Post and Telegraph Department, through A.E.W.S., provides a correspondence

We have tried to make the information given here as complete and accurate as possible, but it should be remembered that changing conditions may invalidate some of it. These articles can be regarded, therefore, only as a general guide. They do not bind Korero or any authority.

course for Section A of the examination. (4) Wireless Operators on ships, aircraft, and ashore. (See below.) (5) Radio Engineers. — A.M.I.E.E. is the best qualification for this. Some technical colleges provide tuition in their evening classes for all examinations from the servicemen’s certificate to A.M.I.E.E. The A.E.W.S. course on radio will be found useful. Note.—The City and Guilds Examinations have been suspended for the duration of the war. Wages for these various occupations are in the vicinity of Z 4 10s. per week for adult factory workers (journeymen 2s. gd. an hour), and £4 15s. to £5 ss. a week for radio servicemen, depending on qualifications and experience. In broadcasting stations, salaries are more or less in accordance with the usual Public Service scale ; technical trainees and technicians £155 to £335 per annum, while announcers, programme arrangers, &c., receive anything from £155 to £SOO per annum, according to qualifications, experience, &c. Salaries above these figures are governed by the appointment held. Wireless Operators These include marine operators and operators in transmitting statious ashore. The former must hold the PostmasterGeneral’s Certificate of Proficiency, and the latter either the Postmaster-General’s Certificate or the Technical Certificate (the examination for which omits Morse). There is no apprenticeship. Candidates for the examinations must be British

subjects and must not be under eighteen years of age. The examinations, which are conducted by the Post and Telegraph Department, are held quarterly. The. passing of these examinations involves considerable study (twelve to eighteen months being the average time). The subjects include the general principles of electricity, theory of radiotelegraphy and radio-telephony, Morse codes, &c. There is a practical examination and also a theoretical examination consisting of two three-hour papers. Since the war a third-class certificate has been issued, entitling the possessor to work as an assistant at, but not to control, a station. • Operators in Civil Aircraft It is now obligatory for all personnel engaged in operating radio communication apparatus on board civil aircraft registered in the Dominion to be in possession of either an Aircraft RadioTelegraph Operator’s License or an Aircraft Radio-Telephone Operator’s license. Information regarding examinations for these licenses may be obtained from the Radio Division of the G.P.0., Wellington.

MOTION PICTURE OPERATING This offers good employment, but the opportunities are limited by the number of picture-theatres in existence. To become an A Grade operator normally takes five years. In 1943, however, the Cinematograph Film Operators’ Licensing Board drafted emergency war regulations to enable male applicants of eighteen years and over (after a three months’ period of training) and female applicants of twenty-one years and over (after a six months’ period of training) to qualify for an emergency operator’s license, providing they are able to pass the board’s exam ination at the end of the training period. Such emergency regulations, however, will not jeopardize the chances of returned servicemen in the motion-picture industry, because all emergency operators’ licenses expire six months after the end of the war. Wages are in the vicinity of £5 15s. to £6 per week.