The Ocean City Student Exchange Program

David J. Danto

Travel thoughts in my own, personal opinion

eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD on all

Ocean City, MD – The Student Exchange Program– July 2024

I thought my wife and I were heading to Ocean City, MD. We had planned to take a small driving vacation to celebrate my birthday, her new job and the Independence Day holiday. Instead, we wound-up touring Eastern Europe.

Well, I know our car went from New Jersey through Delaware to Maryland, but once we got to our hotel on the beach, it was clearly Eastern Europe. The Hilton Garden Inn where we stayed fills 90% of its staff positions with exchange students from The Czech Republic, Ukraine, Hungary, Poland and other nearby places. As I visited establishments along this strip of summer resorts and rentals, I realized it was not just the Hilton – many properties in the area are run by college kids from overseas that don’t know the area at all.

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I appreciate learning from other cultures and am all for giving opportunities to people from everywhere. Unfortunately, there is a significant culture shock that bringing in so many exchange students to run property services can’t overcome with what is likely a brief orientation. Just ask the nice student manning the Starbucks in the lobby how he felt having to look-up one of the complex coffees they serve in a bound manual on the counter. He’s probably never heard of a venti nonfat half-calf chai latte before – nor should he have – but it is one of the norms for a Starbucks customer in the US.

For another example, the hotel restaurant server may never have seen this much western food before, so she probably didn’t know that bringing out the bread, the appetizer and the main courses all at the same time was not a cool thing to do.

When I’m paying a hotel with a Hilton brand over $400 a night for a stay on the beach, I expect that I shouldn’t have to teach the operational team what the local culture’s norms are. Here in this beach town it looks like property owners pay these students next to nothing to run their services for the summer, and pocket the profits that underpaying the staff creates. This is just wrong IMHO.

I’m sure the employees don’t mind a summer at the beach with their room and board covered, but it’s honestly hard to see this as anything other than taking advantage of inexperienced youth while still charging guests as if a fully qualified staff was present. Hilton, Marriott and the rest of the hospitality companies doing this here should be ashamed of themselves.

If you want to learn about Eastern European culture this summer, just come on over to Ocean City, Maryland and you can have the hotel staff tell you all about it while you teach them how to make your iced caramel macchiato in the Starbucks branded lobby coffee shop – that probably costs five times their daily meal budget back home.

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This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal opinions.

All image and links provided above as reference under prevailing fair use statutes.

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