Sustainable Tourism: Training for Tomorrow Erasmus Project

Project Title

Sustainable Tourism: Training for Tomorrow

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 vocational education and training

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Open and distance learning

Project Summary

CONTEXT/BACKGROUND
As the EU’s “Agenda for a sustainable and competitive European tourism” (2007) recognised, one of the biggest challenges for tourism is the sustainable conservation and management of the natural and cultural resources that support it. Europarc (the representative body of Europe’s Protected Areas (PAs)) has long recognised such tensions, understanding that not only are parks themselves facing challenges and pressure from visitation, but they also provide the potential to act as inspiration for more sustainable tourism management models. In 1995, Europarc set up the European Charter for Sustainable Tourism in Protected Areas. The Charter network now counts
106 Sustainable Destinations from 15 countries involving a growing number of local tourism businesses as Charter partners, local and regional government authorities, NGOs and many more.
Over the past 25 years the Charter has been one of the most successful tools contributing to the EU policy aim “to promote the development of sustainable, responsible, and high-quality tourism” (EC 2010). However, an integrated training on the key topics addressed in the Charter is lacking. Furthermore, the Vilm Declaration on “Professionalising Protected Area Management in Europe” (2013) stressed the need for jointly developed training activities and products to improve the capacity of PA managers in relevant associated sectors such as tourism, including development of online courses, shared materials and case studies, as well as highlighting the need to enhance capacity of European training institutions to develop online training as well as standards and curricula for ‘train the trainer’ workshops. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the need for sustainable tourism as visitation to PAs increased, adding new levels of pressure and challenges to PA stakeholders.
This project directly addressed the stated needs by jointly developing a European standard for Sustainable Tourism Training on the key topics of the Charter, aimed at all tourism stakeholder groups working in European protected areas. The project developed a new strategic partnership between educational institutions, Europarc and key regional and national level organisations representing specific stakeholder groups within protected areas.

OBJECTIVES
The project reached the following objectives:
– to significantly increase the quality, supply and accessibility of training in sustainable tourism for PA stakeholders across Europe;
– to develop an innovative, open access, online training platform which enables access to sustainable tourism training for PA staff, businesses, local/regional authorities and others;
– to provide high quality e-learning and ‘blended learning’ opportunities, through the creation of a new, up-to-date curriculum, and supported by a training toolkit, based on end users’ needs;
– to disseminate the training curriculum across European and national networks through a comprehensive programme of multiplier events and dissemination initiatives.

NUMBER AND TYPE OF PARTICIPANTS
Throughout the project a series of Multiplier Events were organised: 180 PA stakeholders from Spain, Italy and France tested the developed platform (including the curriculum) and gave suggestions which were later taken into account; an online Train the Trainer course was organised (the originally planned 2-day face-to-face workshop could not take place due to COVID-19), in which 19 participants from 13 countries were involved; and an online final event took place with 190 participants.
Moreover, all partners did various dissemination activities through newsletters, social media (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram), their website and the project’s website (sttft.eu), etc; these 150 dissemination and communication actions had a large reach.
Finally, the sustainabletourismtraining.eu platform counts over 1200 registered users.

DESCRIPTION OF UNDERTAKEN ACTIVITIES
During the project, five Intellectual Outputs were produced, as planned. All outputs can be found at sttft.eu.
1) A sustainable tourism skills report, based on a thorough Training Needs Analysis was the first output. This included a review of previously published literature, and a survey of Protected Area stakeholders across Europe, resulting in the identification of important knowledge and skills areas, gaps and training needs.
2) A sustainable tourism training curriculum based on the principles of the Charter was developed. Each of the 9 curriculum topics has been elaborated through a fixed structure of content, including: a short video introducing the focus and learning objectives of each topic, key information providing introductory knowledge on key concepts for each topic, containing a theoretical framework as well as practical examples; links to relevant webinars (including a short description) or other video material; a collection of (in total 130) best practices and inspiring case studies; a list of relevant resources containing links to manuals, reports, or extra cases on other websites; and a quiz per topic. Users that successfully complete a quiz obtain a confirmation certificate. An overall completion certificate is sent to users that successfully complete all 9 topics.
3) The training toolkit provides additional supporting materials and resources for those who wish to build on the online platform’s content and develop practical learning experiences around those. 40 activity outlines were produced, that can be used to support face-to-face, online or ‘blended’ learning formats. The toolkit was designed to support different levels of experience in training, facilitation or capacity-building, providing both introductory guidance for those who have never designed, developed or delivered training, as well as a collection of resources and training activities that both experienced and inexperienced trainers can use.
4) The online training platform developed in the project is available at sustainabletourismtraining.eu. The content of the platform (consisting of the curriculum and the training toolkit) is available in four languages: English, Spanish, Italian and French. The platform is addressed to all types of stakeholders with an interest in sustainable tourism development in PAs, such as PA staff, local businesses, local governments, researchers, students and others. The platform’s content stays available after the project’s end through Europarc’s website.
5) The outputs of this project aim to provide a starting point and invitation for PA managers, business owners, public officers, policymakers, trainers, facilitators and any other relevant stakeholders to engage in and promote continuing development of shared sustainable tourism skills and knowledge. A final report outlining a set of recommendations on sustainable tourism training for practitioners and policymakers was produced at the end of the project.

IMPACTS
The “impact+ exercise” was carried out regularly by the project consortium during the project, resulting in the following set of main impacts:
A) the project staff obtained new knowledge, insights and skills on sustainable tourism development as well as blended/online learning and platform building – has discovered new information and practices and apply these in daily work – has an increased number of new contacts
B) the partner organisations have practical training material to offer to PA stakeholders and members to increase their skills and improve their performance – have a recognised training / capacity building program to increase practising sustainable tourism – created an active network of PA stakeholders (e.g. in terms of further collaboration)
C) the learners obtained raised awareness on the importance of sustainable tourism – were facilitated in putting theory into practice – trainers obtained hands-on training material – learners have an attractive way of learning at their disposal – and have enhanced knowledge, skills and competences
D) the systemic impact includes more awareness about the training gaps – awareness and sustained use of the platform – awareness and focus on a (more) sustainable approach in policy making.

In addition, a number of quantitative indicators were monitored on a regular basis throughout the project, for example: the number of registered platform users (per language and profile type), the number of certificates issued (per topic and overall), and the number of unique visitors to the project’s website and platform, and their average time spent on various pages.
In general, this project has created a positive impact for the partners/organisations involved, the participants of the Multiplier Events, the learners and (potential) trainers using the platform, contributing to more sustainable tourism development across Protected Areas.

Project Website

http://sttft.eu/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 349589,44 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIVERSITEIT HASSELT & Country: BE

Project Partners

• Syndicat Mixte du Parc naturel régional de la Montagne de Reims
• UNIVERSITY OF HULL
• FODERATION DER NATUR- UND NATIONALPARKE EUROPAS (FODERATION EUROPARC) EV
• Ente di Gestione per i Parchi e la Biodiversità Emilia Occidentale
• Asociación de Ecoturismo en España