The Importance of Being a Student & Youth Travel Association Member

The Importance of Being a Student & Youth Travel Association Member

SYTA (Student & Youth Travel Association) was founded in 1997 to protect travelers younger than 26 years of age. It is the non-profit, professional trade association that promotes student and youth travel, and it seeks to foster integrity and professionalism among all travel service providers that handle student and youth travel.  As a charter Student & Youth Travel Association member, Music Travel Consultants fully endorses and complies with SYTA’s strict code of ethics. In addition, Music Travel meets SYTA’s requirement that members have tour protection coverage of $200,000 more than that offered by NTA’s Consumer Protection Plan.  Simply put, SYTA is “The Voice of Student and Youth Travel.®”

Educators inspire students to excel academically, socially, and developmentally. Travel is just one of the essential ways to connect and inspire student growth.  SYTA believes that travel is essential to a complete education. When students have the opportunity to see first-hand the monuments they read about in their history books, speak the language they are learning in school, and perform for an adjudicated panel of judges, their level of education reaches heights not possible in the classroom. SYTA is not a travel provider.  Rather, it is an association that represents the travel companies who provide those services and experiences for students. Its interest is to ensure youth and students are traveling with a professional travel company that meets and exceeds the requirements of becoming a SYTA member.

SYTA’s philanthropic arm is the SYTA Youth Foundation (SYF).  One of its major fundraisers is its Running for Youth program. The last couple years, Music Travel Consultants’ own Ryan Morris participated in the half-marathon, a commitment he continued this year and will do annually.  A humble man, Ryan does not like to boast about his speed.  But when he mentioned that there is currently a team of glaciers that are expected to finish before him, we think he may be “putting us on” just a little.  His fund raising ‘speed’ is much faster:  so far he’s raised over $4,000.00, all of it going to SYF’s scholarship program.

Speaking of which, SYTA Youth Foundation really does some amazing things for kids, who otherwise would never have the opportunity to travel.  Grants include individual scholarships and several annual group trip programs. Check out the video below to see a recent year’s “Next Gen Program,” that sent a group of students with special needs from Minneapolis to Florida.



Seeing SYF in action reminds us of how important what we do really is, and how a travel experience can have a life-changing impact on young people. Music Travel Consultants is a Platinum Circle supporter of SYF.   Are you interested in getting involved with the SYTA Youth Foundation?  Please email us or visit the SYF website.

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