Learning  and Exploring Through Travel with Kelsey Perri

⏰Fri, 04/04 22:52PM · 24mins

Transcript

Michelle Passoff

Welcome to Decluttering 55 Plus with Michelle Passoff. This is the place to come for news you can use to get things done. Everybody knows that too much stuff is clutter and cleaning it makes you neater and tidier. To us, it is a life management tool that helps you navigate your next steps. This is what my book Lighten Up for yourself from clutter is all about. As baby boomers, we have a lot in front of us that is confounding and confronting. So we sweep things under the carpet and put them off another day or forever. That is clutter because it keeps us stuck. And my new book addresses all of that. So we’re going to bring experts, authors and authorities here to talk with us about health, relationships, technology, finance, housing. What are you going to do next in life passing down your life stories and even the challenges of making final arrangements? Here we aim to learn, open new possibilities, choose, take action and create a legacy, not a mess. So let’s get started. I’m here today with Kelsey Perri, director of public relations for Road Scholar. That’s R-O-A-D, Road Scholar, a world leader in educational travel for boomers and beyond, as they say. Road Scholar was founded in 1976 as Elder Hostel. And for the last 50 years, the organization has served more than six million lifelong learners in 150 countries and all 50 states. Interestingly, it’s a nonprofit company. And Kelsey is here to talk about its educational programming around the world. So welcome, Kelsey. Thank you for having me. Yeah, you’re speaking to us from Rhode Island, is that right?

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, Providence, Rhode Island, that’s where I live.

Michelle Passoff

Okay, well, that’s a good place to start to go anywhere around the world. As I mentioned in the intro, Road Scholar was founded in 1975 as Elder Hostel. Can you tell us about the evolution of Elder Hostel’s Rode Scholar and what the organization is all about today? Fill us in.

Kelsey Perri

Absolutely. So, as you said, Road Scholar was founded almost 50 years ago. So we’re celebrating our 50th anniversary next year, which is really exciting. And we were founded as Elder Hostel. And the format when we first were founded was a little bit different. It was taking older adults to college campuses, and they would stay in the dorms, and they would take classes in the lecture hall, and they would eat in the dining hall, that kind of thing. So it was more like a back-to-campus type experience for older adults who were interested in lifelong learning. And we’ve evolved over the last 50 years to be more of an educational travel organization. So we’re no longer staying in dorms, we’re staying in hotels, and you might be learning from an academic professor, but you’re more likely learning for them out in the field, you know, out in the places that you’re learning about, and things like that. So we, you know, and then also we changed our name in 2010 to reflect that evolution and the way that people felt about being called elders was also played into that decision-making. So yeah, in 2010, we changed our name to Road Scholar to really just better reflect the organization and what we are today.

Michelle Passoff

but you’re not always on the road. Are you on the road sometimes and in ships and planes? Where does Road Scholar go?

Kelsey Perri

Exactly. So we have we have programs in almost all 50 states and almost 100 countries all seven continents. We have programs by land programs by ship we have A private plane program that travels by private plane. You’re right. So we have all just about any motive We have train tracks. So just about any kind, you know mode of transportation. We have cycling programs We have walking hiking so any kind of mode of transportation you can think of we probably have some kind of related program So you’re out there on the road, but you know in more of a universal way than you know physically necessarily being on a road so

Michelle Passoff

What’s the, what’s most, what’s trending in the world of educational travel? Where are the places? Yeah.

Kelsey Perri

that people are going, well, I would say generally what’s really popular with us, walking and hiking programs in national parks, specifically, people really are interested in national parks. We have a lot more domestic programming than a lot of commercial tour operators because we’re a nonprofit and typically domestic programs are not super profitable, but we’re nonprofit, so we don’t have to worry about that. So so we have a lot of programs in the U.S. We think it’s really important to you know, there’s so much to learn about right here in the U.S. So our national parks programs are really popular in the U.S. as well as our signature city programs, which is will take you to, you know, a great American city and you’ll stay there for six days, five nights and really delve into that city. You’ll be at one hotel the whole time. You get to know the history, the culture, the food, the neighborhoods of that specific city. So we have those all over the country. So that’s kind of in the U.S. And then as far as internationally, we select a campus of the year every year. And this year it’s Costa Rica for us. And so we we pick that based on lots of different things, but popularity is definitely one of those things. So Costa Rica is always a really popular destination for us. So that’s our campus of the year this year. And when you.

Michelle Passoff

When you go, do you go? So you said it might be city centered. So you stay in a hotel and then every day for the six days, you do something different in that city. And then what about when you go to Costa Rica, do you go around the country or do you stay on a resort?

Kelsey Perri

Right, there’s the programs that are more centered in one place and you kind of go out from one hotel and then there’s programs like I believe most of the Costa Rica ones you’re staying at, maybe two or three hotels and you’re going to see kind of different parts of the country getting some different experiences. So yeah, a lot of the programs you’ll kind of travel around by charter bus and go to different places and stay in different hotels.

Michelle Passoff

How many people are usually on your excursions?

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, we’re kind of trending. That’s sort of a trend for us, as we’re trending towards most of our programs are getting to be small group at this point. And for us, small group is max of 24 to 28. Almost all of our international programs at this point are small group. That’s something that I think also was affected by COVID and people not wanting to be in large groups anymore. That’s something that we’ve seen. So that’s, I would say, is our averages around those small groups.

Michelle Passoff

It really breaks up the notion of, you know, I, I, I imagine these big, huge buses driving, you know, 60 people at a time through dragging them through the streets, but this is a much more intimate experience. I guess you really get to know the people on your trip.

Kelsey Perri

Definitely. And another thing, you know, comparing to that, what you think of is like a big tour bus with a bunch of people. All of our programs have listening devices or most of them do, especially the city programs. And so what that means is you have earbuds and then you have a listening device around your neck and your your group leader or your instructor that’s taking you around, whatever you’re seeing, whatever you’re learning about will be speaking through a microphone. So you don’t have like a tour guide who’s got a big group and they’re shouting in a city center and, you know, nobody can hear them. So this way, everyone can hear it right in their ears. You can kind of wander a little bit from the group and still be able to hear. And you don’t have to feel like you’re this big, you know, tour group that’s that’s walking through a city. So that’s also kind of cool.

Michelle Passoff

How many trips a year on average do people take or do you have like once a year, one time, uh, visitors or participants or do people make a lifestyle of traveling from place to place?

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, definitely. I would say probably if I had to guess on average, people are taking one or two trips with us a year and then also doing some other travels, maybe independently or to see family. But I also will say that that is another thing that’s changed since the pandemic is I think a lot of people are making up for lost time. So we’re seeing more people who are taking more trips, you know, whether they had money saved that they didn’t use that year or they’ve just kind of had this realization that, hey, you know, travel can be stolen away from you at any time for any reason. And so there’s just sort of this sense of, you know, don’t don’t waste any time and get out there and see the world. So I’ve definitely noticed people taking more trips, you know, since coming out of the pandemic. And yeah, we definitely have people who take one trip every month with us. Really? I’ve definitely seen. Mm hmm. Oh, yeah. I’ve seen that. We have people that have been on, you know, over 100 programs with us. I know a woman, I think she’s at 247, I want to say right now, 247 trips.

Michelle Passoff

You could sublet her house and, uh, you could use it instead of housing, just keep going on trips. That would be fun. That’s a way to go. So, um, like, what is the most exotic trip that you’ve got? Let’s, let’s talk from the, from the most local to the most exotic. Like, take me on a mental tour.

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, we’ve got like Machu Picchu and Easter Islands. We have Antarctica. I actually got to go to Antarctica with Rhodes Scholar, which is amazing.

Michelle Passoff

less as a matter of fact.

Kelsey Perri

You need to go. How was that? You need to go. It was incredible. It was not as… Don’t let the cold scare you for sure because when I was there, it was like in the 30s. It was like, I’m from Wisconsin. So to me, it’s like, don’t pass up a trip to Connecticut just because you’re afraid of the colds. It was just incredible. It feels like you’re on another planet, just being in a place that’s not habitated by people and where the animals don’t see people as predators and they’ll just walk right past you. Really? Yeah. The penguins will just kind of… They’re not afraid of you because we’re not predators there. So they’ll just kind of… They just look at you and walk past and… What are you doing here? It’s just amazing. Yeah. It’s very, very cool. So I would highly, highly recommend Antarctica. What else? I mean, we have trips in all contents. We have safari programs in Africa. We have Mekong River programs in Asia. We have… Oh, goodness. I mean, pretty much anywhere you want to go, we probably have a trip. Bye-bye.

Michelle Passoff

of how much I need to budget for, I guess there’s a variety of different budgets.

Kelsey Perri

There’s such a range for our program. So it’s, you know, I can give you some generalizations, but, you know, we have four day programs in the US. We have four month programs around the world. So there’s really- Four months at a time? Four months, yeah. Where are you going for four months? I want to hear this. We have World Academy programs that are by ship and it’s sort of like, you know, you’ve maybe heard of like a semester at sea kind of thing. So you’re on a ship for four months and you’re going around kind of all over the world and stopping in a bunch of different ports. So it’s such a, and we have six week programs that are living and learning where you go to a city and you stay in an apartment and you take language courses during the day, but you kind of just live like a local citizen during the rest of your time. I love that. What is that called?

Michelle Passoff

That’s where you learn the languages.

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, they’re called living and learning programs. So we have them in Sevilla, in Provence, mostly European cities, mostly French and Spanish and Italian. So yeah, you go, you take, we set you up with an apartment in a great location that’s in the city center. So you have access to everything in the city and you take language courses with the group during the day and then you’ll go on kind of field trips on the weekend out into the countryside with your group. But you’re kind of just there immersing yourself in the culture and living like a local. So those are really cool. So as far as how much they cost, I would say the programs in the US are, we have programs as low as like 700, I think is what they start at for the US programs, but they’re gonna range probably in the 1000 to 1500 kind of in the US, internationally more like 3000, 4000, maybe something like that.

Michelle Passoff

I’m sure you mentioned the four month programs, but these are week-long programs that you’re talking about.

Kelsey Perri

I mean, some of them are six days. Some of them are 10 days. Some of them are two weeks. There really is such a range. So, you know, you kind of just got to figure out what you’re looking for and then go to our website and just use our filters.

Michelle Passoff

Now you have the problem, you have such a variety, like where do you begin to?

Kelsey Perri

Because I say the Cheesecake Factory problem, the Cheesecake Factory problem, you will open the menu and there’s too many… No, at the Cheesecake Factory, you will get the menu. They have everything on their menu and it’s like, where do I even begin? So, I mean, go to our website, roadscullar.org, and we have a find a trip tool. So it’s at the very top left of the screen. The first thing you’ll see, you click on that. We have great filters. You can filter by price range, destination, what you want to learn about, budget. You know, so that helps kind of get you down to…

Michelle Passoff

your own to figure out where you’re going to go? Or do you have travel agents or advisors that will help you? Yeah, we have.

Kelsey Perri

We have advisors that you’re certainly welcome to call in and they can kind of listen to what you’re looking for and make some Suggestions or if you have questions about a specific destination they can answer questions for you have a great call center. We were we were Based in in our headquarters were in Boston until the pandemic and now we’re fully remote So but most of our our advisors and staff are from the US or North America

Michelle Passoff

It made sense that you can be anywhere in the world while you’re working, right? I think I want your job.

Kelsey Perri

It gives the rest of us flexibility to travel more, too. So if we want to go, you know, even before the pandemic, I went and worked from Ireland for a month and I just worked U.S. hours and I, you know, worked during the week and then I just lived in Ireland. So yeah, it’s great.

Michelle Passoff

What age group is the Rhodes Scholar for?

Kelsey Perri

Yeah. So we have always been all about older adults. So that’s over 50 is kind of what we say. As you said in the introduction, boomers and beyond is what we like to say, but we’re starting to get to the point where Gen Xers are in our age range as well. So that doesn’t really fit quite as much anymore. But yeah, over 50, the average age is 72, but that’s really an average because we have people in their fifties and we have people in their nineties.

Michelle Passoff

couples or singles or how does that work?

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, exactly, a mix of couples and singles. 30% of our travelers every year are solo travelers. And 85% of those solo travelers are women. So most of our solo travelers are women. And we actually did a study this year. I had been hearing anecdotally that there were a lot of our solo travelers that were actually married women who were leaving their husbands at home because they didn’t want to travel. And I thought, wow, that’s so interesting and also kind of empowering and amazing that they’re not letting these guys hold them back. So I did a study on it. And we found that at least 60% of our solo travelers are married and leaving their spouses at home to travel, which I just think is so fascinating.

Michelle Passoff

I was talking to a friend of mine who lives in a 55 plus community and they were leaving on a cruise in a few days. And it was a mix of, it was a women’s cruise and half the women were married and half the women weren’t. So, you know, maybe it’s because of their ability to health wise to be able to, you know, sustain that travel. Well, is it rigorous to go on these tours?

Kelsey Perri

Sure. So, well, let me say first that we did, we did, when we did the survey, we asked people, the people who travel without their spouses, why don’t your spouses travel with you? And the number one reason was they don’t want to travel. They’re just not interested in it, which that’s what I was expecting. You know, maybe it’s health reasons. Maybe their husbands aren’t retired yet and they don’t have enough time. You know, a fair number of people chose reasons like that or they have a dog and they need to stay home. So they split up. Maybe they just have different interests and want to travel. Like their husband wants to go on a golf trip and they want to go do something else. So those were all fair number of answers as well. But the number one reason was their husbands just didn’t want to travel. So my next study that I want to dig into is why don’t these guys want to travel? Why are women so much more interested in travel and so much more adventurous? I just think that’s, you know, I want to know more. So I’m intrigued and I’m probably going to do another study this year to delve into it a little bit more.

Michelle Passoff

are the generation of women who got liberated. So this is forging new frontiers in liberation, I guess you can, if you want to travel alone, you can. And yeah, and I think that doesn’t make it mean anything.

Kelsey Perri

It really is a mark of the demographic that we’re serving that that shift, you know, two thirds of our participants at this point are boomers. And not only are boomer women just more, just more independent and adventurous, but I think we’re just at a time in the world and society that, you know, these women like are allowed to travel by themselves. And, you know, it’s not completely unheard of for a woman to leave her husband at home and travel and, you know, maybe after.

Michelle Passoff

50 years of marriage, you need a break. Exactly. You need a vacation from each other, who knows?

Kelsey Perri

and that’s what we’re hearing is fondness makes the heart grow fonder and if they can go off and out they’re separate adventures and then they come together they got something to talk about again you know so exactly

Michelle Passoff

You also have an ambassador program where people can volunteer. So one of the things people like to do in their retirement is travel for sure, but they also like to give back and volunteer and you have that opportunity. Is that correct?

Kelsey Perri

Yes, so we have about 150 ambassadors right now, and they do, there’s lots of different things that they do, but primarily at this point they go out into their communities. They just help us spread the word about Road Scholar. They go to their local libraries or they organize their hiking group together and they do a presentation about Road Scholar just because they want to help us spread the word and get more people to know about Road Scholar because they love it so much. And they also, they’ll go to like a local senior expo and they’ll exhibit at a table and talk about Road Scholar. And then we’re also actually bringing on a new ambassador dashboard tool that’s going to allow us to use our participants and our ambassadors more in a digital way to help us spread the word on social media and Facebook. So that’s just something that we’re, we’re just onboarding right now, which is really exciting.

Michelle Passoff

And do ambassadors get a benefit in terms of discounts with travel or what do they get for their participation?

Kelsey Perri

Exactly. The more that they participate and the more presentations they do, they can earn vouchers to use on programs moving forward.

Michelle Passoff

Well, that sounds like a good PR program to me. Yeah, everybody, everybody benefits. You can you can be a hostess at a at a theater or you could be an ambassador for Rhodes Scholar. Either way, you get some benefits out of giving back to others.

Kelsey Perri

Yeah, and we were hearing, we even, we’ll hear of our participants doing this, they don’t even know about our ambassador program, and all of a sudden we hear someone’s doing a presentation at their local library, like I’ll see it in a newspaper come up or something like that. And so people are just doing this because they love Broad Scholar, and they genuinely just want to share their adventures, they want to share pictures from their trips, and you know, they want other people to have the same amazing experiences that they’re having, so.

Michelle Passoff

That’s really wonderful. What else should we talk about? How about packing? People go on these trips and then they have to lug the luggage or do you have any, you’ve done enough traveling to be able to tell us when you do travel, what you should keep in mind in terms of, uh, packing, you know, how do you pack for four months? How do you pack for a week? What’s, what’s your secret hacks on packing?

Kelsey Perri

Well, I can speak for my own experience. I also can say that we have a really amazing Facebook group called the Women of Road Scholar, and it’s over 20,000 people at this point. And they, these are the things they’re talking about in that group is what should I pack for this trip? What should I pack for that trip? What are your packing tips? And so overwhelmingly from them and my own experience, the number one thing I can say is try to pack light. I know it’s difficult. You may not know what you’re going to need. But the biggest thing is pack layers, especially if you don’t know what the weather is going to be so that you can pack lighter. You can kind of mix and match. You can just put on layers if you need them. And you know, you always want some waterproof layers. You want waterproof shoes and a waterproof raincoat for sure. I don’t like using an umbrella when I’m traveling. I’d rather have a really, really good waterproof raincoat that I can, that has a great hood. Like a poncho. Yeah, or a poncho or something like that. I don’t like using an umbrella. I feel like it just gets in the way too much and you’re coming in and out of places. It just really gets in the way. So those are two, you know, some really big things I would say. It’s just easier, especially we hear this from our older participants. It’s easier to pack light and to be able to handle your luggage by yourself and not rely on other people. So that’s definitely my number one tip.

Michelle Passoff

Okay. So for all those folks out there who love the prospect of learning and exploring and crossing things off your bucket list, don’t miss the opportunity to pack your bags, join with other future friends on a road scholar adventure that’s R O A D road scholar. And you may be flying, you may be on boats, you may be hiking one way or the other, you’re getting out there. So look for road scholar at www.roadscholar.org and check one more thing off that bucket list. Well, I am going to go home and do that right now. I’m so inspired. Thank you for being with us, Kelsey. Thank you so much. Well, that’s all we have time for today. So let’s wrap things up with a request that you go to our website, www. decluttering55plus.com and click on the let’s connect button, share your thoughts, insights, and tell us the lessons you’ve learned. If you’re facing challenges or celebrating triumphs on your decluttering journey, we want to hear from you connect with us on social media, like us on Facebook, follow us on Instagram, and subscribe to us on YouTube. Let us know you’re part of our community by rating and reviewing us from wherever you’re listening from today. And don’t forget, invite your friends and family, young and old to tune in too. Let’s include them in the conversation. The more, the merrier. Thanks for being with us today. And until next time, this is decluttering 55 plus with Michelle Passoff, wishing you a clutter free day.