As you all know, we at the John A. Hartford Foundation have funded multiple programs designed to recruit and retain health care professionals in geriatrics. We are interested in learning what works: What is the best way to instill enthusiasm in students to pursue a career providing care to older adults? Two of our colleagues, Drs. Judith Howe and Robert Maiden, have written a compelling article on what led them into the field of gerontology. The article, “Accidental Tourists: How 2 Gerontologists Found their Field,” was published in The Atlantic on February 9, 2012, and can be found here.

Both Drs. Howe and Maiden stumbled into their careers and are glad they did. Now they are in exciting careers in aging, working with students and wondering how they can “reshape the landscape of gerontology so that it is viewed as an attractive, rewarding and esteemed career.” Judith Howe states she was fortunate to have several mentors who were pioneers in aging. We have found that mentoring is a key component in recruiting and nurturing students and faculty to the field of aging.

Bob Maiden states that he was introduced to the field through school and experience working with older adults. In our Baccalaureate Experiential Learning Program (BEL), part of our Geriatric Social Work Initiative, we found that BSW students who conducted projects working directly with older people felt more positively towards working with older people and were more likely to pursue a job in aging. The Hartford Program in Aging Education (HPPAE), which provides masters-level students with a rotational internship working in a variety of settings with older people, has similar results. We found that 85% of graduates pursued a job working with older people.

Judith Howe states that we need to do better at getting the word out that “being a gerontologist or geriatrician is a rewarding career, with complexities, challenges, and opportunities given the aging of our cohort, the Boomers.” Let’s start a dialogue here. How did you decide to pursue your career in aging? How do you help to recruit and/or nurture others in the field?

Bob Maiden writes that he sees more interest in aging lately in the students at Alfred University. He wonders if the “service learning courses are having their intended effect.” Are you seeing this? If so, please let us know. We’d love to know what is working and where. Then maybe we can figure out why—and how to replicate it.