Brian Jewell (00:01.454)
All right, everybody. My guest today is an educator whose early work in restaurants, hotels, and even a dude ranch sparked her interest in how the travel industry develops leaders and creates meaningful guest experiences. Today, she's an associate professor and the program director of tourism and hospitality management at Middle Tennessee State University, where her research and teaching focus on preparing the next generation of tourism and hospitality professionals.

Elizabeth Whalen (00:09.205)
Brian Jewell (00:30.108)
Elizabeth Whalen, welcome to the podcast.

Elizabeth Whalen (00:32.632)
Thanks so much for having me. really excited for this one.

Brian Jewell (00:35.054)
I'm so excited to talk to you today. You have such an interesting, career story kind of before you found your place in academia. Tell us about number one. I'm fascinated with dude ranchers. So I have to hear about that, but, but kind of tell us how this, this work in hospitality roles led you to an academic career.

Elizabeth Whalen (00:47.864)
Yes.

Elizabeth Whalen (00:53.676)
Yeah, so when I was, I know this is taking back a little bit ways, but it kind of sets everything up. When I was in high school, I thought I knew what I wanted to do. You know, 16 and knew it all. And I wanted to work for the State Department. I wanted to be a Foreign Service Officer. And so I majored in anthropology with minors in French and Chinese and a whole bunch of other things. And I got to college and realized I had the opportunity to talk to some Foreign Service Officers and realized that wasn't really the path I wanted to go down.

And now what do you do? So I took some extreme measures. I actually signed up for the military. That's a whole nother long story. I didn't actually go. That's a really long story. I'll leave that there. So sometime if you reach out to me, I'd be happy to tell you. But in the meantime, I'm always looking, okay, what can I do? Like I can't just sit around and do nothing. And I had never really considered hospitality.

Brian Jewell (01:31.554)
wow, okay.

Brian Jewell (01:37.926)
Ha ha!

Elizabeth Whalen (01:49.071)
But my first job was actually as a cocktail server at a bar, Molly's Pub. Just kind of your dive bar in the neighborhood and at 20, it was very eye-opening. Because you're like, oh, it sounds so cool to be a bartender. And it was interesting, to say the least. Not for me long term, but I learned a lot and provided some other opportunities financially for me to do some experiences like study abroad.

Brian Jewell (01:54.429)
Okay.

Elizabeth Whalen (02:15.318)
But then when I graduated, I was waiting for that military contract to come through and I needed something to do. And so I had gone to Wyoming on a course when I was in school. And so I reached out to them and said, hey, I just I kind of want to live in Wyoming while I'm waiting for this thing to pan out. And they said, we'll hire you. So I ended up on a dude ranch 60 miles from Cody and between the entrance to the northeast entrance of Yellowstone and Cody. So we were in the middle of nowhere.

Brian Jewell (02:32.148)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (02:43.296)
most beautiful place I've ever been in my life. I absolutely loved living there, but it was extremely humbling. You know, I had done four years of school. I was a 4.0 GPA. I was super academically inclined. And here I am. I'm the only hired employee of this small ranch, the Cape RZ, which I absolutely love and highly endorse and recommend. Family owned place. And I learned a lot. I was the city slicker in the middle of Wyoming, but I got to ride horses every day. I got to hike every day, but

I also did the jobs that no one else really wanted to do. So, dish washing sometimes, four hours a day. I did the housekeeping. And when you have eight cabins with six bunk beds and they're up in the mountains, there's no cart to take with you. So you're just carrying this load of stuff up the mountain to go clean these rooms. And sometimes I think I hit my breaking point when we had a college group staying with us. And so the rooms were full of these college students for like a month.

And at one point I went up there to clean the rooms and it was just an absolute nightmare. And as I'm cleaning, I'm like counting down to the penny how much I'm making a minute because this is so hard to handle. But it was really a wake up call and I realized I was actually really good at it and I enjoyed it and I tourism and I loved being out there and I loved that life, that world.

Brian Jewell (03:52.53)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (04:04.31)
I did that for about six months. That was the only season it was open because it's in the middle of the mountains in Wyoming. So when it's winter, it's not really open. we did both tours in the summer and then hunters actually in the fall when it's hunting season. So came back, still waiting for the military to come through. And I started waiting tables at a restaurant. And I met my husband, which could have changed things a little bit. But also the...

Brian Jewell (04:09.65)
Right.

Brian Jewell (04:16.692)
Cool. Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (04:30.22)
As soon as I started waiting tables, the general manager saw something in me and he said he wanted me to be a manager for him. But in order for me to do that, I would have to tell the military I wasn't interested because he didn't want to invest in training me if I wasn't going to be sticking around. So I did that. And at the same time, I had already taken my GRE for education. And it just so happened that being in Houston, there was a really great hospitality program at the University of Houston. And so I applied in April and they had a rolling admission, got in.

started my master's degree, started managing for PAPA's restaurants in Houston. Did that for about a year and a half, switched over to hotel. So let me see what the hotel world is like. I was an AGM for Drury Hotels for a year and half, limited service property, about 120 keys. And said, still isn't the exact place for me. And I was graduating with my master's and they offered me the opportunity to teach. And that was it. When you hit that part of your career, when you're like this, this is what I want to do.

Brian Jewell (05:13.556)
Mm-hmm.

Brian Jewell (05:23.678)
Hmm.

Brian Jewell (05:27.465)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (05:27.79)
And so I started as a lecturer, completed my PhD, and I've been teaching now for about 15 years. So I love it.

Brian Jewell (05:33.202)
Yeah, well, what an amazing path. I want to talk to you about the pathways into tourism today because they diverse, they are varied, many of them don't go through an academic setting. And we have this big challenge in our industry of just not having enough people coming in interested in the work we do. So I'm curious what your thoughts are about the state of tourism hospitality education.

Elizabeth Whalen (05:40.28)
Mm-hmm.

Brian Jewell (06:01.192)
How are we preparing people? How are we recruiting people? Is it working? Is it not working? What could work better?

Elizabeth Whalen (06:08.651)
Yeah, so the cool thing about hospitality education is it's over 100 years old. I guess despite being older, a lot of people haven't realized it's been around, but there was a transition about 30 years ago and it's an international field, right? So what we see in the US and what's going on in Europe and the Middle East and Asia, it's all development process. But in the last 30 years, it went from being vocational to professional. And that flip is really, really key because

When we're in an educational setting, our goal is not to train skills like hard skills. So we're not teaching them how to use a POS system or how to use Pegasus or how to make a bed. We are teaching them a tool set for moving up into leadership roles and for making good decisions. So how do we better the industry through education, through theory and then application? And so that transition over the last 30 years has been drastic and it's been very, very crucial.

but also that conversation has had to shift the way we engage with the industry and seeing the potential of these students. So when I moved into the Nashville Market I came here in about 2019, there wasn't a program at that point here in middle Tennessee. And so it was a lot of conversations with industry partners or potential partners about what our graduates were. And so initially I would get calls of, hey, do you have a graduate for me to come work in housekeeping? And the answer would be no.

Brian Jewell (07:32.477)
Right.

Elizabeth Whalen (07:32.491)
because they don't need me to get a housekeeping job. They don't need to get a four-year degree for that. But we're looking at that next step up. so recruitment has been great. A lot, we're considered a discovery major here that people are still finding out about this career and this industry of tourism and hospitality, which is what 20 % of GDP worldwide is in this industry. And it's big business. It's applied business. It's a very specific niche. And a lot of times these programs are in business colleges.

Brian Jewell (07:50.706)
Yeah. Yep.

Elizabeth Whalen (07:59.256)
We require our students to get a business minor, but then the service industry is just so unique that we get to specialize in that. And what we're also finding is that the expectations of this generation are so different. In the 15 years I've been teaching, to watch the transition has been wild, but this current generation is so different. And so it's a dialogue about expectations of industry, but also then in return, the expectations of these incoming students.

for the industry to maybe adapt. We came through in a time when I worked in the restaurant and the hotel, I very rarely saw my family. I worked every night, every weekend, every holiday. That was the expectation. 70, 80 hour work weeks sometimes depending on how busy we were. Why do we have to continue that? So how can we adjust the expectations of industry to meet the expectations of students and vice versa? Because we are the fun industry, but not everything we do is fun.

So there are gonna be times when we're doing jobs that are just not very fun, but also one of the things I tell the students is that we are not too good for any role in this industry. So if we're not willing to clean a toilet, we're in the wrong place. Sometimes you're just gonna have to roll up your sleeves and do the dirty work and get it done. And so it's about managing expectations on both sides and then preparing them to enter into leadership roles with best practices, as opposed to coming out and not knowing any of the lingo or

Brian Jewell (08:55.187)
Yeah.

Brian Jewell (09:08.852)
Hmm.

Elizabeth Whalen (09:24.628)
ready to hit the ground running.

Brian Jewell (09:26.228)
Yeah. So tell me more about these students who are coming into tourism through the academic channel, because, you know, as you mentioned, you don't need a four year degree to come up through, you know, housekeeping or, you know, back of house engineering, that sort of thing. So what can you tell us about the students that are coming to you? What has brought them to you and what are the outcomes they're really hoping for? You know, when they say I'm going to major in hospitality and tourism?

Elizabeth Whalen (09:52.802)
That's such a great question. And the thing is, there's actually a pretty good mix. So when I was at Houston, we actually had a lot of international students because hospitality worldwide is perceived differently as a career opportunity. So especially in Asia, it's seen as a high end career advancement opportunity and studying the States is always highly desirable. Here in Middle Tennessee, we serve a very regional population. So we get a mix of those who are already working in the industry, non-traditional students who found that they've hit the wall.

They can't keep advancing. It's taking so long to keep moving up. They're looking for that edge that helps them. And a lot of these high-end positions require a bachelor's degree, so why not get it in the field that they're interested in? But then our fresh students coming out of high school or they're transferring from community colleges, they don't want a traditional job where they're sitting in an office nine to five.

And I tell them maybe someday in the future you'll want that. Guess what? We have that in hospitality too. It might not seem like it, but we do have that when you have a family, maybe you want that more normal schedule, but they want to be in front of people. They want to be engaging. They want to be interacting. But we also have students who are introverts and they're trying to find a reason that the education has a direct ROI, right? So that when they graduate, the investment they spent on this degree has a direct return immediately. That's something we sell to a lot of parents because

they're questioning the value of higher education and we tell them, well, when your student graduates, there's a world of opportunities, even if they're not necessarily ready for leadership right away. The jobs are there and we help them through that process. So we're seeing a lot of students who maybe weren't the best academically. They're like, you know, I'm not an engineer. not some of that, but I want this opportunity to move up. lot of first gen students, I find that the service heart

The heart to be in hospitality comes from people who have had to work really hard. Most of our students work through the entire four years they're here with us because they have to. Some of them worked in high school. And so we take that and we're like, okay, how do we move quickly for you? And so those students who do that will sometimes even graduate into regional manager roles at 22. I mean, they're making more money than I am, which I love. That's like one of my success stories. If you graduate and you're making more money than me, then we've done something right together.

Brian Jewell (12:09.48)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (12:09.852)
And so we're seeing this mix of people who are starting to discover that this industry is so cool and there's so much opportunity and you're not bound. Say I start in hospitality and hotels, there's no reason I couldn't go into DMOs and tour planners or I just had someone reach out. She does specialty event planning and tour arranging for country music stars. You can do that too. Like there are so many ways to take these skills and apply them in different segments of the industry.

Brian Jewell (12:33.844)
Cool.

Brian Jewell (12:39.74)
Yeah, that is amazing. I'm curious about these students who come to you already, you know, part of way into their career. They're working for a hospitality company. Do those companies ever come alongside them and help with the investment, help with the resources? Or is it still pretty much like, yeah, you're on your own kid?

Elizabeth Whalen (12:58.892)
It's a mixed bag. I'd say few and far between do companies do it just depends Like a company that does is Disney, but you have to grind your way through Disney to be able to get that reimbursement We have some partnerships and TSU does with some local Ownership groups. So for example local ownership group of McDonald's here who they I think they own four or five different franchises They will help pay for their employees to get degrees, but most of those are not in hospitality

I find that those who are in that kind of mid-level range of hospitality who are coming back to try to get that degree, there's very little support for them to get the degree because they're happy with where that employee is. But the great thing is being selective in the kind of school you go to here at MTSU, we're very affordable. There are other affordable programs. The ones that tend to not be affordable are your master's degrees.

But that's like the next level up. So there is a great advantage in that too, because again, when you're hitting that wall and you're looking for how do I keep going, that's what it does. I would love for more companies to support their employees to go back to school, because one of the things we do is we do help try to train for best practices. So how can they come back to the workplace and put something better in place, improve the workplace, improve the community and make a

Brian Jewell (14:12.803)
Mm-hmm.

Elizabeth Whalen (14:21.706)
valuable impact. So it's not just here's your degree and now you're going to move off. It's developing in the future of that leader.

Brian Jewell (14:25.918)
Right.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think to the before times pre-COVID, you know, there certainly was this sort of thing where the entry level frontline, maybe service roles turned over a lot. They could be hard to fill. But once you got into management, it was fairly stable. I would see the same people all the time at event after event, year after year. I loved that. But then COVID changed all of that, right? So of course, there's still the frontline issue, but now the middle management, the leadership, the sales rep,

Elizabeth Whalen (14:51.241)
Everything. Yeah.

Brian Jewell (14:58.62)
roles, they're kind of sitting empty in many places as well. And that's causing, you know, just rolling disruptions in this industry that really is built on relationship and having somebody's phone number saying, you know, I know I can text this person and get a quick quote on, you know, whatever that that is all kind of broken down. So there may really be some opportunities for a very hardworking 20 something who just got that four year degree to really kind of leapfrog right into one of those

Elizabeth Whalen (15:01.718)
They are.

Brian Jewell (15:27.366)
management or sales roles that we really desperately need filled. I'm on my soapbox now. I'll step down and hand the mic back over to you. But one thing I'm always curious about is how the business community, the hospitality community can better plug in to what you're doing in the academic world to create better success for the industry, for your students, for everybody. You have some thoughts on that?

Elizabeth Whalen (15:51.691)
Yes, actually that is one of the keys. It was interesting. I was just having a conversation this morning. It's a special case, but we can't exist without our industry partners, right? We are nothing. If we are not graduating our students into the industry, we're failing. But it's not just at graduation that we need our industry partners. It's integrated in everything we do. So I have worked in the industry. I've worked in hotels and restaurants. I've worked in management. I've been in the grind, but that was what 15 plus years ago.

Brian Jewell (16:20.371)
Right.

Elizabeth Whalen (16:21.204)
I'm staying as up to date as I can, but part of that is through my industry partnerships. But that's only a small element because there's so much that we now talk about with experiential learning and engagement, but also mentorship and guidance. So some of the things that we do is we have this really strong advisory board, about 20 different people. I could add even more. There are so many partners who are willing to invest and give back to our program.

But we meet and we talk about what is the industry seeing, what things need to be integrated into the classroom, what opportunities are there for the industry advisory boards to enhance those opportunities for students so that when they graduate, they are ready for those roles that you're talking about. Because if we don't prepare them correctly, that's when they're not ready. That's when they fail. They're in the role for six months and they leave because it either didn't meet their expectations or they're just not prepared for it. And so

Brian Jewell (17:06.249)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (17:12.0)
that looks like site visits. had an alum, he took one of my classes. He wasn't even in hospital, he was in fermentation science. And he took my food and beverage tourism class, which is one of my absolute favorite classes. And we were talking about whiskey tourism and trails and all of this. And he said, you know, I am the head brewer for Liebers Fort Distillery. I would love for your students to come out and see the property. So he brought out my students, he gave them a free tour.

We got to talk to the general manager about the tourism and hospitality arm of that small distillery. They got to do a tasting. They got to engage with the industry in their place. So that was one. We also have a leadership seminar where we bring in 10 different guest speakers. I mean, we bring in guest speakers for the program. We probably have about 30 different guest speakers throughout the year in topics. But in that one, it's 10 different leaders from different segments of the industry who talk about what their career path looked like and how to then are giving advice on how to succeed.

And I bring in recent alumni from our program who are successful all the way to end of career. And they're able to engage with them. They're also required to do a networking assignment where they reach out to an industry leader that they recognize that they're interested in and they interview them. So one of the things that I have, I often have to move people from is reaching out for me just for recruitment, which we do want recruitment. We want opportunities for our students and looking at how can they get engaged in that learning process.

for that program. So it's guest speaking, we have a mentorship program where we partner individual students to individual mentors. And the best partnerships are when that mentor really takes them on and says, hey, I'm going to this trade show or we have this networking event or we have this, why don't you come with me? And so we have those kinds of mentorship programs. We have guest speaking opportunities in the classroom. And then I've had a number of people reach out and say, I really think this topic is super crucial. And I said, well, we have a really small program.

Brian Jewell (18:52.393)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (19:03.243)
As far as we just started in 2019, we don't have all the faculty resources and say, you know what, I want to create that class with you. And so I have one right now that I'm working with in sustainability that she is the CEO of this really cool company, Justice Industries, that collects glass from hotels and then recycles it. She's helping me create a sustainable tourism class. Those kinds of ways to say, I think I can make an impact. Let me find a creative solution, innovative solution of how I might.

Brian Jewell (19:08.638)
Wow.

Brian Jewell (19:23.433)
Hmm.

Elizabeth Whalen (19:31.283)
integrate with the students more than just what are they giving me? So it's a partnership, right? It's not just, I need to fill these holes. I have a gap. You know, I'm not, I can't hire enough people. There's just not enough people who are trained. Well, okay, well, let's get in the training process. And by training, I don't mean how to use the POS. I mean, how am I developing them to understand networking? So like another example of this, we developed a class called professional development post COVID because I realized

A skill that was missing was actually networking and communication. Something that prior to that, I wasn't seeing an issue in. The catalyst for this is we had the Tennessee Governor's Conference on Hospitality and Tourism, which is a great conference that happens every year. And it happened to be in our town, Murfreesboro. And so I reached out, I worked really hard. I said, okay, every one of our students is gonna get to go to this event for free as much as they wanna go to. It was 15 minutes across town, no big deal. I had two students show up.

Brian Jewell (20:27.207)
Elizabeth Whalen (20:27.595)
So I came back to the students and I said, what happened? Why weren't you there? And they said, we were afraid. We didn't know how to go somewhere we had never been before. We didn't really understand what a conference was. We don't want to go alone. I said, okay, we need to fix that. Let's develop a course. So we developed a course in professional development. I also worked with TNHTA, which puts on the GovCon, and we started a new student ambassador program, very pointed. So now students from across the state in hospitality programs are hand selected by TNHTA.

Brian Jewell (20:39.859)
Hmm.

Right.

Elizabeth Whalen (20:56.757)
They are sponsored to go to the conference and they get opportunities to volunteer and network. so like last year, one of the highlights for my students was getting to meet with the commissioner and talk to him about tours in the state of Tennessee. So now we're being a little more pointed about how do we engage students meaningfully, even if it's one-on-one with the students who are prepared and ready to do so.

Brian Jewell (21:17.01)
Yeah, that is really wonderful work. Something related that kind of hits my mind is that it's really popular right now in some older segments of the population to kind of beat up on Gen Z a little bit. You've been working with Gen Z for a long time. You're probably close to having some of your first Gen Alpha students if you haven't had some already. Yeah, that's amazing. So what are the things that we need to know, those of us who are, let's say, Xers and

Elizabeth Whalen (21:35.479)
we have GenAlpha. Yes, we do.

Elizabeth Whalen (21:42.357)
Mm. Mm. Yeah.

Brian Jewell (21:44.936)
beyond or even millennials, what are some things we need to know about some of those inherent soft skills that that Gen Z and Gen Alpha are coming to us with that we can either leverage because they're really cool and we didn't have them growing up or they don't have, you know, maybe the experience on the telephone that we wish they did. How do we bridge that gap?

Elizabeth Whalen (22:03.914)
Yeah, it is a challenge in the classroom too. We're also seeing the challenges, they approach life differently than we do. And I think every young generation has, although I think this generation is more significantly different than previous generations of, it's just youth that will grow in time. I think really the big hit happened in 2015. That was what the big shift was. And then since then it's only grown more exponentially, especially post COVID.

Brian Jewell (22:22.802)
Right. Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (22:34.111)
They want things quick. They want something they can brag about. Everything is instantaneous. If it doesn't clearly show the advantage that they can brag about in some sort of way, sometimes they get disconnected, but you can leverage that, right? So one of the ways I leverage that is by rather than just saying, hey, here's an opportunity. Anyone who wants to join, join us. I say, if you're interested, you have to fill out this form. Just tell me that you're interested and then I will hand select you.

They don't need to know whether or not I pick all of them. I mean, maybe I pick every single person who applies, but now they've applied, right? Like they were selected. So it's about kind of shifting the expectation. They're really creative. They approach things differently, but they also can speak to their peers in a way we just can't. I think very few people our age truly understand how to approach this next generation and really get them.

Brian Jewell (23:07.828)
Yeah. Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (23:27.515)
So for example, we're trying to get more engagement within our program of more people to take advantage of these opportunities. And so I asked students, so we have student representatives on our advisory board and we asked them, you know, what are you looking for? And they said, you know, a lot of times peer to peer communication has the biggest impact. So figuring out what those gaps are, think also individuals are still individuals at the end of the day. And that when we have someone who comes in and then we're like, well, when I was your age,

we were expected to do the grunt work and then we worked our way up. We can't start there. We have to start in partnership with them and say, I see potential in you. Let's figure out what your goals are and let's see how we can make you grow. It's just this flipping of the mindset. You're still having them do the grunt work potentially, but how is that grunt work helping them? You have to connect the dots sometimes for them to help them see how that grunt work actually leads to leadership or even in some cases, ownership or entrepreneurship or whatever it is that that...

Brian Jewell (23:57.853)
Right.

Brian Jewell (24:21.204)
Hmm.

Elizabeth Whalen (24:26.29)
or that new employee is looking for, that next generation is looking for. And so, yes, they're different. Yes, it's a challenge. think there's always going to be a challenge. I think Alpha is going to be very different than our Gen Z. We're already seeing some differences there. But a little bit of patience, a little bit of understanding. I think one of the biggest challenges is, ironically, it's not just Gen Z, the canceling last minute is something you've seen with everyone post-COVID.

you know what, I signed up for this event and I'm sure people have seen this. You know, have an event sign up, 100 people sign up and then 30 show. That's not just this generation and yet we tend to pin it just on this generation. So the same skills that you might use for other things can be adapted to this new generation and just asking them their opinion goes a long way, making them feel like they're part of the team.

Brian Jewell (25:02.099)
Mm-hmm.

Brian Jewell (25:17.576)
Yeah, you know, I feel like you're calling me out a little bit. I've signed up for probably half a dozen webinars since the beginning of the year. And I've watched a couple of the replays, but I don't think I've been in any of them live. So it's that is a good reminder. Some of these things are not just Gen Alpha things. It's just people things. Everybody's busier. Everybody's trying to do more with less. you know, everyone's really doing the best they can. So talk to the tourism professional in, I don't know,

Elizabeth Whalen (25:40.628)
Right.

Brian Jewell (25:47.452)
Oklahoma or Kentucky or Connecticut who's saying, I love everything Elizabeth's saying. I don't think it is realistic for me to try to work with her in Tennessee when I'm half country away. How do those people find your peers at other higher learning organizations and begin to build some of these partnerships and maybe create that course in tour operation and things that probably doesn't exist yet?

Elizabeth Whalen (26:13.818)
that's awesome. So I think a rising tide rises all ships, right? The better tourism and hospitality education is across the country, across the world, the better off all of us are. And I guarantee there's a program near you. Like I guarantee, you know, in Lexington, there's Western Kentucky has a program, right? So there are programs near you and sometimes one email isn't gonna cut it just like in any other industry, right? So as an academic, I can tell you it might not seem it on the surface, but we are...

wildly busy, especially during the semester. And then in summers, well, that's our vacation time. So it's like, what's the good time to reach out? But it's about finding the right person at the right time. And so on all of their web pages, when you look up a tourism hospitality program at local universities near you, you'll see a list of faculty. Handwrite individual emails, look at their profile because we put them online. Look at their profiles, see what they're interested in, say, hey, can we grab some coffee sometime? Can we chat? Different programs will have different structures and different emphasis.

If you know this, there's something called an R1 versus an R2 and vice versa. R1s tend to be really research heavy focused. So if you're at a research heavy focused school and it's a research academic, they might not be as interested in engaging with industry. Maybe, maybe not, right? But it's about just keep trying those different channels, going to events, seeing what they're planning. And it might be reaching out to their, they might have a coordinator, right? So if they're a really big program, they're gonna have a really big staff.

Brian Jewell (27:20.116)
Hmm.

Elizabeth Whalen (27:40.81)
And so you can look at their staff and say, hey, how do I get involved? What can I do? I'm ready. I want to speak. I want to see if I can have an impact. I'm really interested in this. I want to invite students out to tour our facility if you have a facility. I want to tell them about our tour operations. Whatever that looks like, sometimes it's just about finding that right person, like in any other thing that's going to be willing to work with you and network. And sometimes it's just going to take a little bit of legwork.

Brian Jewell (28:07.89)
Yeah, that's great advice. So if anybody wants to get in touch with you or follow you learn more about what you're doing, what would you suggest to them?

Elizabeth Whalen (28:17.182)
So the two best ways is I'm always happy for an email. And even if you have a local school, I might know someone. I have a lot of contacts across the country and I'd be happy to connect to you. So you can email me and my email is eweyland, W-H-A-L-E-N at mtsu.edu. And then the other great way is I'm really big on LinkedIn. I post all the time on LinkedIn. It's something I exhibit. I try to demonstrate for my students how important that networking tool is. I've used it.

to cold call people, cold call, cold message people for opportunities. I'm pretty sure that's how Brian and I got connected as well. So please reach out to me on LinkedIn. I would love to connect with you. I'd love to see what you're doing. Celebrate it because we're really all in this together. I need you. Hopefully that I can provide something back to you in return and we can really just help make this industry better and better every single day.

Brian Jewell (28:54.548)
It is.

Brian Jewell (29:10.76)
Yeah, absolutely. We are all in this together and we're going to link to those resources you mentioned in the show notes so it'll be easy for people to find you. Now before I let you go, we have some questions we ask everybody. These are just for fun. So no pressure. You can answer off the top of your head. When you book travel, are you booking a window seat or an aisle seat?

Elizabeth Whalen (29:23.229)
Okay.

Elizabeth Whalen (29:29.46)
I'm always the window. Yeah.

Brian Jewell (29:30.632)
Yeah, for the view or for something to rest your head on.

Elizabeth Whalen (29:34.186)
For the view and also I don't want to have to get up. Like I want my own little space so everyone else could be over there.

Brian Jewell (29:36.98)
Hmm.

Brian Jewell (29:40.404)
Do you also put in headphones so nobody bothers you? I do that too.

Elizabeth Whalen (29:43.4)
Yes.

I'm an introvert at heart. I might be really good at the extroverted stuff, but I'm an introvert.

Brian Jewell (29:50.524)
All right. So what is something in your carry on that you wouldn't travel without?

Elizabeth Whalen (29:56.06)
Hmm, a book.

Brian Jewell (29:58.376)
Yeah, just anything, whatever is on your reading list at the moment.

Elizabeth Whalen (30:02.282)
You know, whatever I'm reading at that time, even if I don't open the book on the plane because maybe it's too short or I watch the little TV or whatever, I need to know I have the book just in case I want to read.

Brian Jewell (30:13.138)
And is it are we talking hard copies or do you did do digital? All the above. Yeah, that's great. I have a book most of the time these days. More often than not, it's from the library because I mean, what a great resource, you know. So yeah, yeah, absolutely. What would you do if you had a free airline pass and a week with nothing else on your to do list? Where would you go?

Elizabeth Whalen (30:16.106)
Anything. All right. I'll do both.

Elizabeth Whalen (30:28.636)
Love you, everybody.

Elizabeth Whalen (30:36.522)
no. I think my number one bucket list, and has been for a long time, I'm waiting for my boy to get a little bit older, but we want to go to Japan.

Brian Jewell (30:46.418)
Mmm. You know, that's right up there for me too. Have you been?

Elizabeth Whalen (30:50.122)
I've not, so I spent time in China, but I've never been to Japan. It is. Yeah. And so I want to get there before it gets too crazy, too busy. I mean, I think it are.

Brian Jewell (30:53.576)
Yeah, same for me. It's very high on my list. I feel like Japan is just surging right now in popularity. So, yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the last question is somewhat related. What's one thing you have seen or done on the road that you wish you could go back again and experience with somebody you love?

Elizabeth Whalen (31:15.72)
Machu Picchu.

Brian Jewell (31:16.912)
Mmm. That's pretty...

Elizabeth Whalen (31:18.748)
Yeah, I by myself. Actually, I was teaching a course in Lima. We had a partnership and we did a semester long online and then I went down for a week of intensive courses and then I attached a weekend. And if you've ever gone to Machu Picchu, it's pretty intense. You fly from Lima to Cusco and then you have to get from Cusco to the train station, then train station to Aguas Calientes and then you have to take the bus up to the top of Machu Picchu. And now it's very restricted. I went before it was restricted, but I would love...

Brian Jewell (31:35.656)
Yes.

Brian Jewell (31:47.431)
Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (31:48.724)
I would love to be there with friends and family.

Brian Jewell (31:51.66)
I feel the exact same. was there, I don't know, a year or two before I got married and it was astounding and it's one of those things where you're like, man, if I had somebody special, this sure would be the place to bring him. Yeah.

Elizabeth Whalen (32:01.93)
Yeah, it's one of those things pictures just don't do it justice.

Brian Jewell (32:06.248)
Yeah, yeah, they absolutely don't. Well, Elizabeth, it's been a real pleasure. Thanks so much for joining us today.

Elizabeth Whalen (32:12.35)
Thanks for having me. This is great.