Friday, October 2, 2009

Exploritas/Elderhostel "Relaxes" Age Limit of Participants

A Message from President James Moses


Dear Friends,

Since our new program name was recently unveiled, I have fielded many questions and concerns about the age eligibility for Exploritas programs.

The widely circulated and erroneous idea that we will be seeking new participants as young as 21 has become a lightning rod, and has led to a false fear that our programs will be overrun with overly energetic 20- and 30-year-olds. The simple message is that we won’t be actively seeking any participants younger than Baby Boomers, but neither will we be turning away any adult who loves lifelong learning.

Elderhostel has been, and Exploritas will continue to be, a program created for and attractive to older, primarily retired adults.

Before 1975, older adults had very few organized ways to learn, grow, and experience adventure. When Elderhostel was founded, it was exclusively an organization for adults 60 and over. It was something special, almost a rite of passage, because it provided opportunities that weren’t previously available. Later the age limit was changed to 55, and this change had no impact on the average age of participants. When we launched Road Scholar in 2004, those programs had no age limit (other than the requirement of being legally an adult), yet the average age of participants was still over 60. For years we've allowed, even encouraged, people over 55 to bring along their younger spouse or partner, or for that matter, their adult children.

As we considered the decision to apply the Road Scholar standard generally to all of our programs, our thought process was this: Why should we bar a 54-year-old (or a 53-year-old, or a 52-year-old) from coming on a program if they have a sincere interest in the destination or the subject matter? Why should we turn away a 32-year-old who wants to go on a program with her 60-year-old mother? Once you start unraveling this thread of questions, you quickly realize that any formal age limit is totally arbitrary. Does that mean that our programs will suddenly be flooded with 20-somethings? Nothing in our past experience suggests that will happen because, for the most part, people in that age range choose to do other things with their available time.

There’s a related concern about how a broader range of ages might affect the activity level of a program. Once you understand that there won’t be a flood of younger participants, this concern should mostly go away, but there’s still a point that needs to be made. While it’s certainly true that, in general, people become less active as they age, there are lots of exceptions, particularly among our participants, who we know are atypically hale and hearty for their age. I've seen many, many people 70-plus who can out-hike people decades younger. If people are honest with themselves (and with us) about enrolling in programs at the right activity level, a mix of ages should not be a problem.

In summary, we all need to remember and remind others that there is a huge difference between "actively seeking" and "not turning away." Our goal as we relax the 55 age limit is not to change the atmosphere of our programs, but to adopt an open, welcoming posture. We don’t want to turn away any adult who has a genuine thirst for learning, affiliation and meaning, and I believe that anyone who looks beyond the sound bite will agree that this is our proper position and the right decision.

If you have any comments or concerns you’d like to share, please send me an e-mail to comments@exploritas.org.

Sincerely,

James Moses
Elderhostel President

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