Ellen Hoggard, President of High School in the USA cultural exchange program, a part of GEC, Global Educational Concepts, shares memories of being detained at the Berlin wall, hotels with bullet holes in the walls, and being followed by the KGB, and talks about staying true to yourself at forks in the road, getting 100s of kids home during Covid, some tips on what to pack from a VERY well-traveled person, and ALL that we have to gain from worldwide cultural exchange.

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High School in the USA

Today's guest is Ellen Hoggard, President of High

School in the USA cultural exchange program, a part of GEC,

Global Educational Concepts right here at the Southwestern

Family of Companies. Ellen, thank you so much for being with

us today. How does someone find their way into the field that

you're in with cultural and international exchange programs?

Well, thank you for asking me, and thank you for

having me. And you know, honestly, the best way to learn

about international educational exchange personally is to either

host an exchange student in your own family or to go on an

exchange yourself. And I actually, personally have done

both things. I went to England at the age the little age of 14

years old, and came running home from high school as a high

school freshman with all these papers, and said, Mom, Dad, I

want to go on this exchange program. And they looked at each

other and said, what's an exchange program? I had to

convince them that this is a great idea to go to England for

a summer and live with the host family. And my parents knew I

was always interested in everything International,

because I heard all the stories about my ancestors from Scotland

and Ireland. So of course, I wanted to go explore, so I went

to England for a summer, and then we hosted my English sister

for a few weeks, I think a month. She came back the next

summer, and my host mom from England, she came and stayed

with so actually, I've been in touch with my host mom until

last year, when she sadly passed away. But these are lifelong

relationships that you create and have forever with these

people. And then, because I got bitten by that bug, I went to

Romania of all places, on a music exchange with my high

school at 16 years old. That was the most formative experience of

my young life, because no one at that point in the 70s was going

to Romania. It was a very communist country. Behind the

Iron Curtain. Everywhere I went, I was always the first American

anyone ever saw. And it was not lost on me that the presumption

was that Americans were evil and we were bad people, because

that's what their media had told them, because they literally

only had the Communist Party feeding them whatever they

wanted to say. This was an incredible moment for me in

Romania to be talking in my very poor French to Romanians, that's

their second language, and trying to have a Romanian

teenagers talk to the American teenagers with me on my program.

And I want to be honest with you at that moment, I remember

standing in Romania thinking, I don't know what my life's gonna

look like when I'm a grown up, but I have to do something like

this, because I could see at that young age that there were

so many misconceptions and misunderstandings about our

countries, but we were all just young teenage kids. We liked the

same things, we listened to the music, we found commonalities,

and I was hooked.

Yeah. I grew up in Germany for about seven, eight

years, and it was during, well, the very, very beginning of my

life, there was still a wall up, wow. You know, my dad and mom

were opera singers, and they would perform in East Berlin, so

they had to, like, transit, you know, across that line and then

get to be worried about crossing back over. And the conversations

that you'd have, you know, just talking to my dad about it was

with people in East Berlin, and they all love the arts. It's

kind of what brought them together. But cultural sharing

and that wall that was put up really prevented that for many

years. It created a metaphorical wall between the cultures and

east and west. And I think about that when we talk about

international exchange, because when I moved to the States to

western North Carolina, there were not a lot of traveled

people in that community, and there was some layers of lack of

understanding and context, and a lot of honestly negative things

come from that. But I think how important it was to my childhood

to have an international perspective on life.

So you understand our experience in our world,

probably better than anybody having lived there in very

formative years in your life. I spent a lot of time in Germany

running what was called the Congress Bundestag exchange

program. That's it's actually one of the oldest exchange

programs supported by the German Bundestag and the US Congress.

And we send hundreds of Americans for a year, and they

send hundreds of Germans for a year to live in each other's

homes and go to high school. And I was deeply honored to run the

vocab. Educational part of that for nine years. So I went back

and forth to Germany twice or three times a year. And I won't

go into the whole story, but let's just say I went to East

Berlin every year, and one year I broke all my own rules from my

students. I didn't tell anyone I was going. I went by myself. I

stayed too late, and I actually was detained at the Berlin Wall

for probably, um, they took my passport away, and I was

detained for several hours, and it was a very interesting

experience for me to really understand and appreciate what

democracy and freedom really means, because in those hours

where no one knew where I was because I was foolish and young,

I realized what blessings we have to be able to come back,

but the East Germans that eventually, that I don't know

what it was in my paperwork, that red flag me. But

eventually, because I stayed calm, I spoke very politely,

they eventually let me go back, and the East Germans in the line

with me to help me through, helped me get on the right

train, because I was so unnerved I was going to get on the wrong

train and go further into East Germany. But again, people are

wonderful. People are people all trying to help each other.

What's so interesting about the work that

you do, because on an individual perspective, it's very eye

opening and formative and and you build these cross cultural

relationships. I think in a macro perspective, it can shift

a country's dynamics.

100%. So at one point in my career, I was deeply

honored to be the person who was sent all through the Soviet then

It also plays a massive role in creating

Soviet Union to convince ministries of education to sign

the first agreements ever allowing High School long term

exchanges between Soviet and communist countries in our

country, and one of my favorite was liszthuania. I took a 12

hour train ride that turned out being a 15 hour train ride from

St Petersburg to Vilnius, and there was no heat on the train,

no food on the train, but I shared this compartment with

this lovely couple. He was a veteran from World War Two. They

shared their food with me, and I bought blankets for all of us.

And I just remember thinking, I just need to get to Vilnius and

get a cup of coffee in a hot shower, because I had the first

group of liszthuanian teenagers to ever come to the US long term

waiting for their orientation program from me. And I stepped

off the train, and the gentleman I worked with in Lithuania said,

Welcome to Lithuania, we're thrilled you convinced the

ministry to let this happen. And by the way, there's no hot

water, there's no shower for you, but we'll get you a cup of

coffee. So I said, Okay, wow. Okay, beautiful, gorgeous

cultural relationships for countries, and really brings

country. I can't say enough about this part of the world. I

cannot say enough about that part of the world that is not as

well traveled by Americans as other parts of Europe, I highly

recommend everyone to go and Romania. I have to put a pitch

in for my host country, where I'm not going to lie. It was

very emotional when I went there and signed the first agreement

with the remaining government for the first long term exchange

students. I got there just after the revolution, and the hotel I

stayed in still had bullet holes in the walls. My family wasn't

too happy about me going, but nothing was going to stop me,

and we did sign the first agreement when I went at 16. Let

me be clear, it was a short term, three week music exchange

supported by the Reader's Digest. Fast forward to the

early 90s. These exchanges were long term students coming for

five months or 10 months, serious exchange. And by the

way, not accompanied by a KGB agent, which my group was the

whole time we were in Romania. They came on their own. They

stayed with families. It was a true, pure, real exchange

experience for these kids.

people and understanding to a different level.

Yeah. The other thing I'll mention about

exchange, just to plug it, is there's 64 high school exchange

programs like high school in the USA. We're one of the newest,

but we're populated by a team that has, collectively over 75

years of experience running high school exchange programs. And we

all came here because we wanted to work with people like you and

GEC and the integrity and ethics that Southwestern brings to

every business they support. Plus we are the only high school

exchange program in the United States that offers our high

school exchange students the beautiful LEAD program, and this

knocks the socks off of every exchange student that comes. And

what we really want to do is build the leaders of tomorrow to

go back to their countries and really do their best for their

countries.

Yeah, the injection of entrepreneurial

spirit that coming to the US and having that experience can

change a country, absolutely. Yeah, thanks for sharing that. I

think you know in your personal journey, you've moved into roles

that involve leadership. How did that shift for you, Ellen, from

going the student in the exchange, said, now we're like

handling the operations of the exchange.

That is a great question, and I will just say,

first of all, with great humility, this was a quite a

long journey. I think the reason I'm so happy sitting in this

chair and so dedicated is because I've literally done

every job in the industry. I worked from administrative

assistant position at AFS. That was my first job. I ran all the

end of state programs for 3000 AFS, ers. And when you work for

a non profit, we're very used to wearing about 20 hats at once,

getting paid very little. You either have that work ethic or

you don't. And you learn a lot. You have to learn all the

logistics. This is pre cell phone, pre internet, we had maps

all over the walls, and you really had to learn a sense of

strong logistical management that not only didn't scare me,

that inspired me, because I saw the kids having a magnificent

time. AFS is old. They're the oldest exchange program, but

that was a brand new department that I built with two other with

two guys and myself, and then I moved into another program,

where it was a consortium of five exchange programs, running

the Agency for International Development participant training

program for people from the developing world to come and

learn skill sets to take back to their home countries. Then I

pivoted to Sister Cities ran their brand new intern Trainee

program. By the time I got to this chair, to be honest, I'd

done pretty much every job, and I did that on purpose because,

like you guys say, you can't teach what you don't know, and

you can't leave where you won't go. So being in a leadership

position at this point in my career, the joy I have, in

addition to my passion about international exchange, is

watching my staff and helping my team become a 2.0 better version

of themselves.

So in that journey and holding all those different

positions, what were some of the more challenging moments?

That's a great question. Well, the immediate

thing that comes to mind is I was in charge of over 400

students close well, around 400 students when COVID hit, and

having to find a way to shepherd and care for 400 young people

from 20 plus countries when none of us really knew the facts

about what was happening, what was going on. We were working

seven days a week, round the clock, having I remember having

leadership global meetings at 7am every single day, and we got

every student home safe and sound. Because as a mother, I'm

a proud mom of two wonderful young ladies who are in their

20s now, I just felt the most important thing to do was to get

all these children home to their families safe and sound, and

then see how COVID unfolded. But I have to tell you that that was

daunting. There was no road map. There was no advice that we

could follow. I had to follow my gut instincts, knowing that as a

mother, I wanted these children to be safe, and I had to keep

everyone calm, not only were the students and families freaking

out, we were all freaking out, right? The whole world was

freaking out. So I had the students, first and foremost,

the host families, the local coordinators, but the courage I

saw during that time frame, you cannot believe what these

families did for these kids, because we'd have a flight

arranged, but airports were shutting down. Local airports

were all shutting down. I had families driving kids to

different states hours at a time, keeping them safe, getting

them on planes. I had flights shut down when they'd already

gotten to some of those airports, and they had to pivot

and get them to another airport. And think about it. These people

are doing this as volunteers, but these children became their

children, I would say, as a young person, probably one of

the biggest challenges for me. I got up the ladder quite quickly

in my career to a very senior position, and I was working for

a program that was taking very good care of me. I had a huge

future there. But then I was asked to do things I wasn't

comfortable doing, and we all had that fork in the road moment

in our life. I had to make a decision whether I wanted to

stay and keep going in that direction where I can make a lot

of money and do very well, but I realized that you only have one

reputation, and you better really honor it. So I resigned

from that position, I gave a month's notice, and that was a

pivotal moment in my life, where the road, there was a fork in

the road, and I know I took the right fork. And when you're up

against these personal and professional challenges, you've

got to remain true to your your soul, your integrity and your

belief system, and then somehow things do always have a way of

working out. And I'm no Pollyanna, life is bittersweet.

You've got to saber this sweet and deal with the bitter.

You know, this is kind of an interesting take on

it too. But what are some of the bigger stereotypes that you've

seen broken down because of the nature of hosting and bringing

in a new culture like, you know, when I first came to this team.

States, people just had this association in the community I

lived in that Germany was like a communist country, right?

Because it wasn't so long ago that East Berlin was a thing,

and I just had to kind of explain and share that it was,

you know, socialism is a little different than communism. Even

socialism, it was pretty capitalistic on the western

side, whether or not that same form of structure would work

great in the US. It works very well for German people. But what

are some of those stereotypes that you feel like you've seen

broken down as a as a result of your work?

That is such a great question, and may I please

echo that Germany has one of the strongest economies in the

world. So you know, hearkening back to when we started bringing

these young people from they were truly communist countries

at the time, I think people were astounded at how open minded the

teenagers were. They expected them to come over here and kind

of spew the party line or tell them that, Oh, it's great where

they live. I mean, they have so much to be proud of in their

beautiful countries. No matter what your politics are, everyone

has a beautiful culture and country to share. But I will

say, on both sides, both the students that came and the

students that still come, they were surprised quite often at

how normal Americans are, and you know, we're just regular

people, and the streets are not paved with gold, at least not

where our exchange students go. In fact, not, pretty much

anywhere I've gone. So a lot of stereotypes were washed out on

both sides. And over and over and over again, I've seen people

say things like, I never dreamt that you would be open to going

to a baseball game or or considering that. You know, here

in America we we volunteer so much, one of the biggest

impressions all of exchange programs make on young people is

the spirit of volunteerism, and the kids embrace it and take it

home or replicate it in their home countries worldwide,

volunteerism is just not as big a thing. And people coming to

this country, I want everyone to understand, are so impressed

with you, all of us that wait you actually choose to volunteer

at your church or in your community or as a boy scout or

at school and help the homeless like this is astounding to

people, and it's a great virtue that we export. But when the

kids come, I think American families and schools understand

there's so many beautiful things in their cultures that we can

learn from like you mentioned about there are other economic

systems that work just fine. It's astounding to people here.

It's just a beautiful blending of the world globally. And I

just think everyone comes away from these exchanges a happier,

more fulfilled, wider viewed person.

Yeah. I had a really interesting conversation

with a friend of mine who is in the medical device arena, and he

was explaining how a lot of doctors have very niche

practices, and in the device world, he sometimes would see

what other doctors did in different laboratories or

different segments of medicine. And because of that, he would

begin proposing the creation to his distributors of new medical

tools, because they were being one way in a brain surgeon's

hands, but they could have equally been used for a spinal

surgeon, and it just made me think of how often we miss an

opportunity to learn by studying another culture or craft, that

there are applications here in The US, for how we run our

country, for how business operates. And we, you know,

sometimes we do think everything we do is probably the best way,

but that often is somewhat ignorant of the fact that there

are some really good practices elsewhere that we can learn

from. And likewise.

Well, I really love the fact that when kids

come here, one of the things they always say to us is, am I

What's so polite here? Like they're not used to customer

customer service is not a thing in most of Europe the way it is

here. And we're so well, we assume this is the way it should

always be, right? So we can certainly learn so much from

other cultures, their beautiful food, their like, the efficiency

of their systems in many cases, like you could eat off the floor

of the trains or in the bathrooms. I was just in Rome,

and you literally could eat off the floor of the bathrooms in

the conference areas and in the public spaces. And I think of

the world, this is a kind of silly analogy, but I think of my

life and the world like this beautiful I love food, so I

think of it as a beautiful menu. And if we choose from a, choose

from B, choose from C, and then put together the best, most

beautiful menu you could ever imagine, because we're so lucky

in this time in the world that we can travel. So much and bring

young people and exchange students to us, so you can kind

of take the best parts of things you like, consider the other

things, maybe they're things you don't have as much love for. And

okay, that's fine, but the world's a pretty great big menu,

if you let it be, and then your life can be populated by the

things that you've learned through the people you meet,

through the places you go, through the students you host,

and our host families, by the way, they end up going to their

students, weddings. They go visit their students families.

And when you typically go visit a student you've hosted, don't

even try to open your wallet. You will not be able to open

your wallet, because their families are so grateful for the

incredible love and experience and attention making their child

a part of their family. When you go to their home, they'll do

everything for you. It's and this goes. This is generational.

This isn't just for once. I have friends of mine who've been in

exchange as long as I have who are now going, not only just to

weddings, of their exchange, who's getting married, but a few

of them are starting to have their they call them their

exchange grandbabies. I mean, it's incredible.

Lifelong connections. It's huge. I want

to go through, if you don't mind, like maybe a quick

lightning round of questions with you. When you travel

internationally to another country, what are the top two

things that you bring that might not always be on people's list?

That's a great question. Let's see. What do I

bring? Well, I need, like, snack bars through the day, I always

bring snack like, really healthy snack bars. I stick them, I

stick them all over my suitcase, and then, because I'm always on

the move, I can't necessarily always grab stuff quickly. So I

always bring my snack bars. That's number one. And the other

thing is, I always, always bring super comfy shoes, because when

you're traveling around the world, I mean, for my business

meetings, I have to have my fancy schmancy heels, right? But

I bring a briefcase that what people will never know is my

workout sneakers are always in the bottom of it. And because

I'm walking everywhere, I love to walk, because that's how you

really see a place, right? You don't see a place taking cabs or

whatever. But I love to walk, so I'll always wear my walking

sneakers and my socks with my fancy outfit. And then just when

I get to the building, I found a bed to sit down change to my

heels and shove my sneakers. And you gotta your feet have to be

comfortable and you have to have snacks. So those are my top two.

That's awesome. I love that. And then, do you have

a favorite quote?

Yes, I do. I was so weird in high school that my

quote was a Ralph Waldo Emerson quote under my picture. You know

how we always used to put our I don't know if they still do,

well, yes, they do little quotes, but they're usually

like, you know, go go crusaders or go lions, or, you know, mine

was this. We are that which we see build therefore your own

world. Ralph Waldo Emerson, yeah.

Fits really well with what you do, because your

lens is a big part of how you you can't color the world

without seeing it through your eyes, right?

That's right.

This is an interesting one. Define, if you

can, eloquently, what success means to you, and when you know

you've achieved it?

That's a great question. Success means to me,

having done something in my life that I hope has positively

impacted and made the world a better place in small ways and

big ways, success means to me, honestly, I really am a strong

believer that we have to put our families first, even though I'm

you can see I'm so passionate about my career. Success is

impacting the world through exchange. That's my big success.

But the bigger success for me, if I'm being really honest, is

that my family respects me and is proud of me, and they know

that they always come first. If I've accomplished that, which I

try, then I think I will have been a successful person.

I'm a little bit of a sci fi guy, I saw a limited

run TV series, the whole theme, you could tell of this series,

everybody's on a spaceship. And what the author of the series

really wanted you to understand is, you know, he just put it in

a metal craft. But the reality is, Earth is flying through, you

know, the universe, and it's literally a living spaceship,

right? I mean, we're all on a rock collective. And all these

dynamics that happen in this show kind of happen in real life

on Earth, and that's what makes the show interesting. And it

just made me realize that, you know, we all, we don't always

realize that we're all on the rocket ship together. Love that

the exchange, the understanding of different cultures, the

ability to build Ross relationships and learn from

each others, is incredibly important to making sure we

don't blow up the spaceship.

I couldn't say it better. Thank you for that.

That's absolutely true and we're all so busy looking upwards at

our own journey, I encourage us all to look to the left and look

to the right as we hopefully move upwards in our in our

evolution of ourselves and being better people, and as we climb

whatever ladder it is that's important to us, I urge everyone

look to your left and look to your right, because guess what?

You'll see, like a million ladders of people all climbing

up and trying to get there too. And we're all trying to do but

in a way, well, we all should try and do it in a way that

helps each other, because maybe somebody's ladder, one of the

steps, is rickety. Maybe you want to hold your hand out and

say, Can I help you up there? That's something I was taught a

long time ago in my own family that we're here to help each

other. And you know that's replicating success, right? All

the ladders going up together, let's help each other.

Yeah, there's room to do that. Well, I really

appreciate you taking the time to be our guest on the podcast

today. Alan, thank you for sharing some of your wisdom.

Thanks for the work that you do with international students, and

I wish you the best of luck as you pursue your mission.

I can't thank you enough. This has just been a

joy, and I can see why they have you doing this job, because

you're wonderful at it. Thank you so much for having me today.

You got it, absolutely.