All sorts of awards are available for radio amateurs. Probably the most prestigious awards come from the Amateur Radio Relay League (ARRL) which is most likely the oldest amateur radio organization in the U.S.A. It was founded in 1914.

Two of their most famous awards are "Worked All States" (WAS) and "Worked All Continents" (WAC).

The WAS award indicates that the awardee has had radio contacts (QSOs) with all 50 states in the U.S.A. Washington D.C. counts as Maryland. Territories such as Puerto Rico don't count. The most difficult state to get was Alaska. I had been on the air for almost a year before getting an Alaska contact.

The WAC award indicates that the awardee has has QSOs with 6 continents: North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. Antartica is not counted since it has no permanent ham stations.

There are now many amateur radio organizations that give awards. The only two with which I currently am a member are QRZ and POTA.

QRZ is a "logging" site which keeps track of QSOs. It offers a variety of awards including equivalents of WAS and WAC. I've earned seven of these awards.

POTA is the "Parks on the Air" website which keeps track of QSOs made under certain rules at national and state parks. A park "activator" is a ham that sets up a ham radio station at a park and makes at least ten contacts. A "hunter" is a person that makes contact with an activator. At this time (May, 2026), I've been an activator twice. With ten activations, I'll get an award. Being a hunter is much easier - you just have to find an activator on the air and answer his/her call (and they have to answer back). Most of my POTA awards have to do with my hunter activities.

The slide show contains all my awards to-date. Note that if a certificate was issued before November 1, 2025, it was with my old call sign, WB5RIX. But the organizations combined my old and new call signs, so all the awards have my new call sign: N5BK.

Click here for instructions to run the slide show.