"Adult travel programs are very seriously grounded in academic content and wonderfully fun at the same time. Participants are driven by passion for the topic, destination or both."

Joan Gore

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Joan Elias Gore, Ph.D.

Adult Study Abroad Programs on the Rise

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PEOPLE WITH IMPACT INTERVIEW - Joan Elias Gore, Ph.D., Director of Travel Programs for the School of Continuing and Professional Studies at the University of Virginia, is pioneering the field of adult study abroad. In this interview, she discusses the adult travel program initiative and how recruitment and retention techniques differ from traditional undergraduate study abroad programs.

Q: Can you explain a bit about the adult study abroad initiative and why it is important?
Joan Gore: We are developing a series of adult travel programs that allow adult populations to study both domestically and abroad, an opportunity that might not have been available during their college years. These educational experiences are short term—4, 7, or 10 days in duration—in order to accommodate an incredibly diverse adult population that most likely has work or family-related commitments. There is a remarkable age range of participants from 18 year olds to those well into their 90s—we see college students learning side by side with their parents and grandparents, best friends sharing a unique educational experience, as well as groups of teachers that are thrilled to meet their peers and national thought leaders. Adult travel programs are publicized nationally and internationally, and while a fair amount of University of Virginia alumni partake, participants enroll from across the United States and the world over.

Adult travel programs are very seriously grounded in academic content and wonderfully fun at the same time. Participants are driven by passion for the topic, destination or both. They want lectures, readings, and to actively participate in the subject matter. Often times, participants tend to treat faculty leaders like rockstar groupies—they are so fascinated by their area of expertise and extremely appreciative for the chance to interact with the people whose work they have been following for many years. Unlike traditional undergraduate study abroad opportunities, while short in duration, are truly vibrant intellectual experiences. These programs should not be confused with alumni travel programs, which are more vacation destination programs rather than lifelong learning opportunities.

Q: What types of program offering exist?
Joan Gore: For a full list of program offerings and descriptions, please visit http://www.virginia.edu/travelandlearn.

This year, for example, we are offering a program called Civil Rights South wherein Julian Bond, one of America’s foremost civil rights leaders and the chairman of the NAACP, will lead adult learners through key sites of the civil rights movement. Participants have unique access to resources—meetings are arranged with Rosa Parks’ lawyer, Martin Luther King Jr.’s sister, as well as Congressman John Lewis, who marched across Selma Bridge alongside Dr. King. Another popular program is our Civil War program, during which we have over a hundred adults traipsing around key Civil War battlefields and listening to lectures from prominent civil war historians. We also offer an extremely popular program at Oxford that is like a summer school for adults with lectures and field visits, and we are really excited about our program with Smithsonian traveling museum exhibit called Jamestown, Quebec and Santa Fe: The Three Foundings of North America. This program series commemorates the 400th anniversaries of the foundings of these locations with a cast of incredibly talented thought leaders.

Q: Is this a trend that you see catching on at other institutions?
Joan Gore: In a way—many other institutions have developed elder hostel programs, which have been extremely popular. They are often less seminar-based than the adult travel programs at the University of Virginia, but still an important adult educational experience. Continuing education schools around the country are looking at these models and deciphering how these kinds of programs can be developed at their own institutions.

Q: How does recruitment differ for adult populations from undergraduate study abroad student recruitment?
Joan Gore: The two audiences—student and adult—are very different from one another not only in age range but also in what program developers are asking of these constituencies when they go to recruit. These differences affect how to best market to these populations, as well as the idea of retention. Student recruitment generally has certain areas of critical consideration:

Target prospects— The goal of undergraduate study abroad prospecting is to recruit a student for a program—a semester, or even an academic year—and they are looking to recruit for a one-time-only participant. In terms of adult educational travel, successful recruiting targets adults that are excited about the programs and will return to participate in other program offerings in the future.

Use of the online marketing versus the distribution of printed materials— Adult populations often use printed materials more than internet tactics, but adults must be targeted via the web also. Printed materials are typically more important for adult learners and typically less important for students.

Direct versus gateway marketing— In general, the goal of adult program recruitment is to get the word out to individual travelers, whereas in student study abroad, not only is it important to get the word out to individual students, the primary initiative is to target gateway sources, the people that are going to let their students know about your programs, specifically faculty and study abroad advisors. With the adult population, such gateways are rare and typically more abstract.

Advertising— Student study abroad lends itself enormously well to online advertising due to the online directories that exist, such as studyabroad.com and iiepassport.org, while it is more difficult to execute online advertising for adult travel programs where adult educational travel directories do not exist. I think it would be extremely beneficial to launch a website specifically geared to adult study programs—there is a market for having a site online where adults can go and look at a wide variety of programs available in one place. Again, print advertising is a most effective way to reach the most diverse adult audience, therefore they typically advertise in national magazines like the New Yorker, National Geographic, The Smithsonian and other specialty magazines in order to reach specifically targeted audiences.

Q: How does customer service and retention differ between adult travel programs and student study abroad?
Joan Gore: In regards to retention, the key point of differentiation is when retention is cultivated. For student study abroad, orientations in the first few days of a program are critical—often, programs will lose students in the first few days because they are overwhelmed and not coping well. After that first week, however, retention means something different. Students are retained at that point—99% of students that participate in study programs don’t come back until the end of their programs, while others will attempt to extend the duration of their stay by another semester. When students return, if students have had a positive experience, they become program champions and become important recruitment tools, especially if universities set up post-program contact/peer advisor programs.

In adult travel programs, retention is very different because the goal is to develop a committed audience as a growing core constituency. Programs are generally very short, so a key retention issue lies in creating the highest possible quality experience in a short time, taking care in the construction of programs to cater to adults, and giving special consideration to how adults learn, the balance of lectures and activities, what is fun and exciting to adults that will contribute to great intellectual experiences. If you can create programs that are academically, socially, and visually interesting, programs will see repeat attendees. Retained students feel so confident about the quality of experience that they are willing to consider other topics and programs will see a core of the same participants, many of whom have developed friendships through the intensive bonding experience.

Joan Gore is a veteran of study abroad, having worked with some of the biggest and most successful enterprises, including AIFS, CIEE and Denmark’s Study Abroad (DIS). Prior to her work in study abroad, Dr. Gore held faculty, Assistant Dean, and Study Abroad Advisor positions in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Virginia. Joan most recently published a book titled Dominant Beliefs and Alternative Voices: Discourse, Belief, and Gender in American Study Abroad, and has contributed articles, book chapters and other written content to international education publications including Peterson's Study Abroad and NAFSA: Guide to Education Abroad.

See an index of all the "People with Impact" Interviews

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