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Youth Movement

The Stamp Collecting Report, I'm Lloyd de Vries.

We hear it all the time: Where are the young collectors? Who will carry on the hobby?

Of course, stamp collectors were whining about that in the 1890s, and the hobby is 
still here. 

There ARE younger collectors, but maybe we could be doing more outreach.

"There's really no concentrated effort that focuses specifically on enthusiastic and 
bright young philatelists, between the ages of, let's say, 10 and 25." :08

Alex Hyman is one of them, a senior at George Washington University. He proposes 
fellowships to support and encourage these young stamp collectors.

"Then bring the fellows to the big shows and have them give presentations and meet 
dealers and other collectors and really infuse and give the opportunities to these 
young collectors that might live in states where they don't go to a stamp show because 
there's none near them, to come and experience the biggest and exciting elements of 
our hobby"  :16

The common wisdom is that most young stamp collectors stop in mid high school and then 
pick it up again later in life. Haimann says it doesn't have to be that way.

"Assuming that there aren't young philatelists that would continue through if they had 
the right encouragement has weakened our ability to think, in my opinion, rationally 
about creating real, substantive young adult programs" :11

It's important to act now ... to have leaders in the future.

"Let's find them now and encourage them with the leaders today so that we don't have to 
think 'Will it happen?' but just know that it will happen." :06

I'm Lloyd de Vries of The Virtual Stamp Club. For more on stamps and stamp collecting, 
visit virtual-stamp-club-dot-com.

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