DEVELOPMENT OF EUROPEAN CURRICULUM IN THE FIELD OF SUSTAINABLE CAMPING RESORT MANAGEMENT Erasmus Project

Project Title

DEVELOPMENT OF EUROPEAN CURRICULUM IN THE FIELD OF SUSTAINABLE CAMPING RESORT MANAGEMENT

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Overcoming skills mismatches (basic/transversal); Cooperation between educational institutions and business

Project Summary

The market share of the camping industry within the overall European tourism industry is sizeable. It generates 12 % of all overnight stays in Europe and in some countries, around one third of all overnight stays (such as 33% in Denmark, 32 % in Luxembourg and 29% in France). It is worth approximately 12 billion EUR and it consists of 28.400 campsites and generates 400 million overnight stays. (Eurostat, 2019). With its unique potential for sustainable growth and green economy, the camping industry can play an important role in protecting the competitive advantages that make Europe the most attractive tourist destination in the world. The CAMPMASTER project contribute to the body of knowledge available educating young people on how best to achieve sustainable growth in the camping industry and to raise awareness of this unique opportunity in the camping sector.

The starting point of the project is that, despite the growing significance of the camping industry for the overall European economy and its potential role in meeting the demands of the green transformation, there is a lack of any formal education specialised in camping management in Europe. Because of the specificity and complexity of campsite services and the future transformation of campsites into green resorts, existing tourism education at higher education level does not correspond with the actual nor future skills needs of the industry. By adopting the participative approach that facilitates exchange and a co-creation process between different stakeholders, this project proposes set of actions at international level for closing the gap between current and future skills in higher education in the area of sustainable camping management.

As a result, the main objective of the project CAMPMASTER is to prepare the ground for the roll out of a first joint Master programme in Sustainable camping resort management. The project will consist of defining, based on a strong cooperation between camping industry stakeholders, university teaching staff and students a framework for competences, knowledge and skills of a camping resort manager and derived from it, a curriculum and the organisational structure for a joint Master study programme.

The project will produce four intellectual outputs. Firstly, the learning outcomes and modules of the future Master study programme on Sustainable camping resort management will be defined (IO1). Secondly, the partners will develop the complete curriculum with all syllabi, teaching and assessment methods for all courses (IO2), using the manual on how to draft syllabi. Thirdly, these outputs will be made publicly available alongside other open educational resources (OERs) on the newly developed Learning platform for the camping industry (IO3). And finally, research and analysis into the best practices in sustainable camping management will yield a selection of teaching case studies that will be equally open source (IO4). Duration of the project of two years comes out of the ambition to start with the study as soon as possible and to join European efforts in building green society.

The project will involve three European universities specialized in tourism and hospitality education, located in Croatia, Spain and The Netherlands and it will have a strong European dimension.. The project also includes three partners from the camping industry – one national camping association from Croatia, one regional camping association from Gerona and one European camping association of the best European campsites representing in total 12 European countries.

The target groups in this project are students and university teaching staff who will participate in the preparation and also future implementation of the joint Master programme. Students will gain recognition and experience, while teaching staff will benefit from better teaching competences through their cooperation on designing, developing and testing innovative teaching methods across borders. The professionals in the camping industry will also benefit from the opportunity to influence the learning outcomes of the joint Master study programme and therefore the skills of their future workforce. Finally, through the dissemination of the project results, especially the Learning platform, entrepreneurs and managers in the wider camping industry will benefit from better research, resources and know-how on sustainability in camping management.

After the completion of this strategic partnership project, the expectation is to start the enrolment of students into the new joint Master programme in Sustainable camping resort management that will be performed across three universities (Girona, Breda and Rijeka) including an internship programme in the best European camping resorts. This university-business cooperation at EU level is expected to contribute to a better awareness of sustainability in managing camping and an overall increase in quality and competitiveness of the sector.

Project Website

http://camping-master.eu/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 165892 Eur

Project Coordinator

SVEUCILISTE U RIJECI & Country: HR

Project Partners

• Associació de Càmpings de Girona
• The Leading Camping & Caravaning Parks of Europe e.V.
• UNIVERSITAT DE GIRONA
• STICHTING BREDA UNIVERSITY OF APPLIED SCIENCES
• KAMPING UDRUŽENJE HRVATSKE