Today’s older adults – Baby Boomers, in particular – are making it clear that they are not interested in senior living options that isolate them from their communities and other generations. They want to avoid being relegated to what Andrew Carle, longtime senior living veteran and president of Carle Consulting, calls “an elderly island.”
In light of those strongly held preferences, university retirement communities are naturally attracting growing interest and popularity among older adults and the providers that serve them. In general, URCs are senior living communities that are affiliated with universities. The closeness of those affiliations can vary, though, with some communities being located on college campuses while others reside in the same community with a range of programming and activities that connect the school and community.
The first retirement communities associated with universities started at Iowa State University (Green Hills) and Indiana University (Meadowood) in the mid-1980s, according to Carle, but growth of these types of communities has accelerated in recent years with more likely on the horizon. Carle said URCs offer unique differentiators from other communities.
“We’ve built a lot of really nice communities in our industry, and there are many beautiful communities and happy residents in them,” said Carle, who started the universityretirementcommunities.com website. “But we also know that the retirees today want – and all the studies have shown this – three things: They want active, they want intellectually stimulating, and they want intergenerational retirement environments. And if you think about it, I just described a college campus.”
Senior living is ripe for disruption that creates an attractive space for URCs, said Lindsey Beagley, senior director of lifelong university engagement, ASU Enterprise Partners. Beagley leads the integration of the residents of the Mirabella at ASU senior living community into the Arizona State University ecosystem. URCs attract those “who feel they still have more learning, growing and living to do,” she said.
“We see the next wave of retirees increasingly rejecting the status quo of what retirement looks like because they feel younger than their parents felt at the same age,” Beagley said. “Environments which are isolating, unengaged and age-segregated do not resonate with them.”
A URC, meanwhile, offers an environment that is far from isolated or disconnected. Of Belmont Village Albany, a university retirement community connected to the University of California Berkeley, Carlene Motto, chief marketing officer at Belmont Village Senior Living, spoke in terms that echo those others use when referring to URCs when she said the community is “a vibrant, intellectually stimulating haven where aging gracefully is not just a goal but a reality. It is like we are crafting our very own Blue Zone right here, and our seniors are loving every minute of it!”
A wide range of benefits
The benefits of URCs start with their abundant opportunities for intergenerational interactions.
“Intergenerational activities and friendships are incredibly powerful for older adults,” Motto said. “These interactions provide a sense of purpose and fulfillment.”
Beagley said that the needs and assets of older and younger generations are complementary, and age segregation only became a characteristic of retirement lifestyles in the past 60 years. “And I would argue our social fabric has suffered because of that development,” she said.
“Intergenerational connections have an extraordinary impact on the cognitive, social-emotional and physical well-being of everyone involved as well as the community,” Beagley said. “We know from research that some of the benefits for older adults specifically include decreased social isolation, improved self-worth and sense of life purpose, improved cognitive and physical health such as improvements in balance, strength and walking, and intellectual stimulation that results in new learned skills and knowledge that help to support continued engagement and citizenship. We also see things like reduced ageism in both directions, which supports more intergenerational dialogue and cooperation.”
The opportunity for intergenerational connections makes for striking popularity for many URCs. For instance, Beagley said that Mirabella at ASU has as many 60-year-olds as 90-year-olds – “I think you’d be hard-pressed to see any 60-year-olds in a traditional life plan community.”
Carle noted that university retirement communities enjoy presale rates that “blow the roof off anything else we see in the industry.”
“Some of these places are 80-90% leased before they even open,” Carle said. “They fill up very quickly. And there’s a reason for that. This is what the next generation of retirees are seeking. They’re not seeking leisure. They’re not seeking to retire to a sleepy community on top of the mountain. They want to be in intergenerational environments. They want lifelong learning.”
Motto cited a resident who mentioned that he chose Belmont Village Albany because its UC Berkeley affiliation “attracts a certain caliber of residents, individuals who are engaged, vocal about community happenings – the type of people he wants to spend this chapter of his life with.”
“This sense of camaraderie and shared values enhances the connections between residents and the overall experience,” Motto said.
The past connection of residents to affiliated universities can vary. Motto said about 70% of the current residents of Belmont Village Albany are affiliated with UC Berkeley, and a vast majority of the waitlist contains individuals with university connections. In contrast, Beagley said a majority of residents at Mirabella had no prior affiliation to Arizona State, though about 20% do.
How they engage
Engagement opportunities depend on the community, but successful URCs provide residents with many options that can best fit their interests and preferences.
Beagley said she works hard to help residents feel “a deep sense of belonging on campus.”
“They get student ID cards to be able to access anything on campus that a student can. We tour various labs, exhibits and facilities,” Beagley said. “We bring in faculty to offer a weekly lecture. We collaborate with academic units to bring students into the community and create meaningful roles for residents on campus. By design, we want to remove any real or perceived barriers to full integration on campus.”
Beagley said one of the aspects of the URC model that she loves is that there is no finite list of activities coordinated for the community. There is regular programming in the building, but “the sky’s the limit if they want to venture onto campus,” she said.
“It becomes a highly personalized exploration and opportunity for discovery and growth,” Beagley said.
She said about 40% of Mirabella residents regularly audit classes, and almost half of the community regularly attends performing arts or cultural events. Many attend athletics events. Ongoing volunteer gigs are popular, such as working with international students to improve their conversational skills, reviewing student theses, assisting in labs, coaching student entrepreneurs and helping out in the early childhood education center.
“There are too many examples to list, but most will tell you they got too overscheduled their first year and had to get strict about only doing the things that really light them up,” Beagley said.
At Belmont Village Albany, Motto said residents engage with the university through a variety of activities, such as theater and musical performances and other live events. In addition, they also can audit classes, participate in university-led excursions and engage in intellectual discussions and meetings within the community.
“One of the most significant advantages is the opportunity for intergenerational learning and interaction,” Motto said. “Students gain valuable experience by engaging with an attentive and knowledgeable audience of seniors. This interaction helps students develop their teaching and communication skills while providing seniors with intellectual stimulation and a sense of purpose.”
Carle said the presence of students in the communities is essential – whether they are volunteering or working part-time or spending time in the facilities as part of a class or research project.
“It doesn’t do you any good if the students aren’t coming into the community – it can’t just be the residents going to campus,” Carle said. “It really feels different when you walk into a URC, and you see students walking around. That adds a lot.”
At Belmont Village Albany, art students from the University of California Berkeley share their artwork with residents, who discuss the works with them.
“This exchange is mutually beneficial – students gain valuable public speaking experience and receive constructive feedback, while residents feel a renewed sense of purpose,” Motto said. “Witnessing students’ vulnerability and passion helps residents feel connected and inspired. These interactions often blossom into meaningful relationships, enriching the lives of both the students and the residents.”
In Mirabella’s first year, it launched a student artist-in-residence program that has four graduate music or music therapy students live in the building each year in exchange for them offering programming support.
“It was rocky for all of us at first to figure out how it would work, but I’m glad we persisted because this program has become the crown jewel of our community,” Beagley said. “Residents have formed such special and enduring bonds with these students through a shared love of music, not to mention a robust calendar of almost 400 musical events per year from top-notch talent. Some have even reported that the program was the reason they ultimately decided to move in.”
Beagley said on a large campus such as Arizona State it is important to have a dedicated campus staff member who can help curate experiences, make connections and encourage exploration. “The college experience has changed so much since they were students that it can be an intimidating place,” she said.
In addition to those efforts, Beagley helps to socialize Mirabella within the campus culture. She noted that faculty, staff and students at Arizona State initially had limiting ideas about what Mirabella residents could do or would want to do on campus.
“Once they met them or engaged with them through a lecture or a tour, they could see the value of connecting these incredibly experienced, knowledgeable and educated people with their students,” Beagley said. “That’s when creative ideas around how we could collaborate really started to flow.”
A promising venture for universities
Beagley noted that senior living communities and universities historically have not intersected, leading to some inevitable complications.
“They don’t share the same language, time horizons, risk assessment, regulatory constraints, organizational priorities, etc.,” Beagley said. “It requires some imagination and a shared commitment on the part of all stakeholders to get out of our routine approaches to realize the mutual benefits of these kinds of partnerships.”
The emergence of university retirement comes at an important “inflection point” for higher education, Beagley said.
“There are significant forces that are requiring the sector to evolve, and we’re seeing a lot of institutions fail to stretch in the way they need to,” Beagley said. “Some of those forces include the demographic shift to a more age-diverse society, the increased human lifespan and rapidly changing technology. These all impact the future of work and education. Colleges and universities have to figure out how to serve the needs of learners across the life course – from emerging adulthood, through mid-career upskilling and reskilling, to post-career learning.”
Against that backdrop, university retirement communities serves as a living laboratory for colleges and universities to explore how to best meet the unique needs of older learners and to transform the campus environment to one where different generations can learn and engage with each other.
“At a place like ASU where almost 35% of students are first-generation college students, the presence of experienced, educated older adults with the time and interest to engage with young people is an incredibly valuable strategy to shore up student success,” Beagley said. “It’s just a win-win.”
Carle said that many colleges are struggling with declining enrollment, and the demographic of college-aged students is projected to drop precipitously in the coming years. As a result, many schools are looking for creative solutions.
“I tell university presidents all the time when I consult with these schools that their mission statement says they serve the community and their community is changing,” Carle said.
In general, college graduates tend to feel strong nostalgia for their years in school, making them natural candidates for university-retirement communities, and universities can strengthen relationships with their 65-and-older alumni, faculty and staff through the communities as well as build new relationships with other older adults. Meanwhile, the partnership can bring a variety of potential financial advantages, such as from leasing land to a community or naming rights royalties.
“There’s lots of strategic benefits for them, lots of mission benefits for them, lots of philanthropic benefits for them,” Carle said.
Looking ahead
Motto said the integration of retirement communities within university campuses creates a unique environment where seniors, students and families coexist and interact every day, “enriching the lives of all involved,” and she would like to see that environment continue to flourish and evolve.
“Increased awareness of this mutual benefit will, I hope, sprout more engagement expanding to connections with a larger variety of disciplines within universities,” she said.
Beagley believes university retirement communities are only the start of innovative collaborations between senior living and higher education.
“There is lots we can do and learn about how to stitch together generations in mutually beneficial ways,” Beagley said. “This is becoming a coherent field and I’m excited to be a part of it.”
Beagley expects the demand for university-retirement communities to explode in the years ahead – not just in the U.S. but globally and particularly in Asia.
“The timing is right to deepen our understanding of the essential elements that are needed in any location or university context to make these models work,” Beagley said. “They also need to become more accessible to a greater number of middle-income older adults. As with most innovations, they debut at the top of the market and are priced for more affluent early adopters of the concept. I hope the rising demand will force developers to get creative about how we expand beyond that narrow segment.”
Carle, for one, is confident in the long-term prospects of URCs.
“These communities, when done right, are going to be the first choice in the market for the next 50 years.”
Making it official – A formal certification process in the field
Around 2005, Andrew Carle was serving as executive-in-residence at George Mason University, teaching the first academic curriculum in senior living administration. He became aware of a mix of retirement communities that were associated with universities. He became intrigued. He piled his family into the car and drove around the country – he estimates a total of about 3,000 miles – visiting these communities to see them at work.
What he found was that the communities were developing organically and with mixed results. Some projects were not clicking, and some involved universities that were not fully engaged. Others, though, were promising, offering unique benefits in the field. From his exploration of those communities, Carle developed a five-criteria model for success for university retirement communities.
Today, Carle is the creator of the website universityretirementcommunities.com, which has become a go-to source for residents, prospective residents and senior living providers interested in what is happening and available in this niche today. The site has a directory that currently includes about 85 communities and several resource partners. And a new aspect that promises to play a major role in the years ahead is that the site will be the host for the first certification program for URCs.
“The program will finally, for the first time, after all these years, bring some real structure to this sector,” Carle said. “You’ve got 85 communities, and some of them are fairly loosely connected to a host academic institution and some of them are fully integrated. It’s really confusing the retirees and everybody else about just what is a university retirement community.”
Years ago, Carle was the primary writer of a certification program for senior living communities developed for JD Power, and he brought that experience to creating one for university retirement communities.
The program is focused on standards built around Carle’s original five primary criteria for success. Communities will be able to voluntarily apply for the certification. Under the program, those who meet all five criteria can be certified as “University Based Retirement Community (UBRC)” and will be the only ones able to use that term for themselves. If they meet three or four criteria, they will be certified as a “University Linked Retirement Community (ULRC).” And if they meet one or two criteria, they will be certified as a “University Affiliated Retirement Community (UARC).” Carle copyrighted the terms almost 20 years ago and a certification trademark has been created for each going forward.
The key criteria are:
- Proximity. “We like to see them built within a mile of the main campus. One thing that 20-year-old students and 80-year-old residents have in common is that many of them don’t have cars,” Carle said. “But we also know that culture, that environment around university campus, is important.”
- A full continuum of services. “We’ve seen that these folks, more than any other senior living consumer, really don’t tend to leave, and don’t want to be told that they’re going to have to leave,” Carle said. “Who’s going to tell the retired university president or the wealthy alum who was the first to move in that their last memory of the school was they were kicked out because they need some skilled nursing at the end of their residency?”
- Formalized programming. “Not a handshake. Not an ‘OK, we’ll figure it out later,’” Carle said. “They need to have what the programming will look like in writing. Written letters of agreement. What services and amenities can the residents access? What things can students or faculty access in the community, whether it’s internships or practicums or volunteer or employment on the resident side? How do they access lifelong learning? How do they access the performing arts venues? How do they access the athletic events? Do they get a student ID? Can they use the bookstore? All those things need to be in writing.”
- A formal business relationship. “They need to be incentivized on both sides to ensure the financial long-term success of the community,” Carle said. “When they don’t have that in place, one party or the other can drift away – what I call a ‘stranger on campus’ scenario, where they end up having nothing to do with each other. I like to see some kind of financial incentive for them to work together.”
- At least 10% of the residents have some connection to the university, such as being retired faculty, retired staff or alums. “If one out of every 10 residents is wearing that university sweatshirt, I think it tends to really bring the culture and feel of the university into the community,” Carle said. “If it’s less than that, I think it’s very hard to feel like you’re really part of the university.”
“Once we have a formal certification program in place, that’s going to be just a game-changer for retirees, not just for retirees, but for the whole sector,” Carle said. “The ones who are really integrated at the highest levels across those five criteria are going to be differentiated and really stand out as the cream of the crop.”
Carle expects to announce the first community certified under the new program this summer.
