Planning a Post-Student Trip Sharing Event
How to Use Post-Tour Meetings to Build Interest in Future Trips
Summer student educational travel does not end at the airport baggage claim area. Keeping alive collective memories of the trip experience as well as recruiting for the next trip should be key reasons for facilitating a post-trip get together for all participating students and their parents. Hosting this event should, ideally, be several weeks after the trip has ended.
Activities and Events at Post Trip Parties
Trip participants should be encouraged to send their best trip pictures to one person designated to collate them into a digital album so that everyone will obtain a disc at the party. Students can also bring their pictures to the event.
If any participant taped portions of the trip, these can be viewed during the party. Students requesting copies may be asked to pay a small fee in order to either duplicate the video or combine several trip videos into one DVD.
Students can also bring souvenirs purchased during the tour to share with others. “Show and tell” at any age level is an excellent way to stir interest in future trips, particularly if teacher group leaders tend to repeat tour itineraries.
The Trip Survey
Prior to the post-trip party, the teacher group leader should prepare a survey and mail these to all participants (or construct one on-line). Participants should be asked to respond before the date of the party. These surveys can be simple or they can be comprehensive. Surveys are a wonderful tool to use in planning future trips.
Surveys can address a number of issues including:
- Transportation used on the tour
- Quality of meals served
- An evaluation of hotels
- What specific activities students liked
- What specific activities students found boring
- Evaluation of the tour provider and on-site tour director
- Any concerns not covered in the survey questions
Survey results can then be discussed at the post-tour party.
It is often helpful to obtain parental feedback as well. In most cases, parents pay for the trip and may have younger children they would like to send on future trips. Just advising parents that their input is important goes a long way in creating better experiences in the future and shows parents that their observations are valuable and taken seriously.
Post-Trip Party Enhancers
Food and music helps to enliven the post-tour party. Students and parents can be encouraged to bring something that relates to the specific countries visited. Toward that end, the event facilitator can send out a check list that requests parents to advise by email what they would like to bring so that five people are not all bringing a Black forest chocolate cake or Italian pasta.
If the trip was school-supported, the party is the perfect place for students to plan a school bulletin board (assuming this was approved by the school administration) showcasing the trip. This activity also helps to stir interest in future trips and serves as an excellent recruitment tool.
Students may also wish to create a trip web page that highlights the itinerary, includes pictures, and daily journal-type entries from trip participants. Special sections can be created to highlight items such as:
- The funniest trip experience
- The most embarrassing moment on the trip
- The longest wait
- The best trip excursion
The post-trip party is also a time to seek volunteers willing to write articles about the experience for local newspapers or school student publications.
Benefits of the Post Trip Party
- Maintaining the tour momentum
- Sharing positive experiences
- Creating interest in future trips
If everyone is involved in the planning and facilitating of a post-tour event, minimal time is spent to put it all together. Should the event be held at school or in a home? If parents offer their homes, this is usually the best solution. Students tend to “be themselves” while the overall atmosphere tends to be more laid back.
Students at the Moscow Circus
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