The ARRL offers a few free training courses to HAM operations to help assist them to prepare for emergency situations. Just like the FEMA courses, these are self-paced online courses that you can work on. These are “nice to have” pieces of training that will greatly improve your abilities to operate.

However, these do not take the place of the required FEMA pieces of training needed to participate with your local ARES/RACES. And actually, the FEMA courses are prerequisites for the ARRL courses.

To take the ARRL training courses, you must first register with the ARRL: http://www.arrl.org/online-course-registration
(NOTE: Registration does NOT require becoming an ARRL member for these courses)

Basic

• EC-001 Introduction to Emergency Communication
  • Prerequisites:
    – FEMA IS-100.c & IS-700.b

Advanced

• EC-016 Public Service and Emergency Communication Management for Radio Amateurs
  • Prerequisites:
    – EC-001 Intro to Emergency Communiactions
    – Skywarn Training
    – FEMA IS-100.c, IS-200.c, IS-700.b, & IS-800.c
  • Referenced:
    – FEMA IS-120.c, IS-230.e, IS-235.c, IS-240.c, IS-241.c, IS-242.c, IS-244.b, & IS-288.a
    
• PR-101 Public Relations 101 for Radio Amateurs