The project
Background
The project InterCAT – INternational team for Circular and Accessible Tourism was conceived from the applicant’s local context, Tusa, a rural town in the central-north of Sicily struggling to find its development niche to grow sustainably and reverse the chronic depopulation phenomenon over the last two decades. Looking further, the problem of town abandonment happens not only in Tusa, but reportedly a prevalent trend from north to south in Italy). At the same time, in Europe many countries fall into the list of “fastest shrinking countries”, especially those in the eastern part (Latvia) but without excluding the western ones (Portugal, Greece and Spain).
Europe has always been a major player in the global tourism map, but tourism is becoming more complex and requires higher levels of skills and is faced with challenges because of the changes in global trends and increasing competition with non-European countries (e.g. Asia and North America).
In order to enhance the attractiveness of European destinations, it is necessary to increase the number of highly educated operators and experts in the sector and being the “early birds” in embracing emergent tourism segments, such as Circular and Accessible Tourism for long-lasting growth.
Objectives
InterCAT aimed to strengthen the core competencies of VET trainers, tourism students in vocational colleges or VET centres and hospitality operators when providing services to tourists with access needs as a result of capitalising on the few but existing VET training curricula and best practices over Europe.
With InterCAT project we wanted to achieve the following objectives:
- to identify and exchange the best training practices in Italy, Spain, Latvia, Greece and Portugal according to an evidence-based approach, to be compiled into a Glossary of Training Items for Circular and Accessible Tourism;
- offer solutions to skills mismatches in Circular and Accessible Tourism and shortage of labour in the sector;
- to adapt existing learning methods and materials with new evolved methods and realities in Circular and Accessible Tourism (CAT), using DIATool (Destination Image Analysis tool).
Implementation
InterCAT focused on the development and exchanges of best practices in non-formal education skill-building in order to successfully enter these emerging economic sectors.
Following the project activities implemented:
- Desk/ Office Work were partners could obtain needed background knowledge on the situation of CAT in their country and at EU level; as well as constructing appropriate training contents;
- International Mobilities: 3 Transnational Meetings (KoM in Italy, Mid-Term Meeting in Latvia and Final Meeting in Spain) and 2 Learning Mobilities (Portugal and Greece) that allowed partners and participants to have a better reality-check and reliable access to knowledge of the CAT circumstances and skill requirements;
- Public Relations and Dissemination: These activities ensured the delivery of developed results to reach the desired quality and amount of audience.
Results
The project produced the following results:
(1) A 6-day Training Course for Staff and Trainers on CAT in Ponte de Lima, Portugal where VET trainers and educators could exchange knowledge and experiences in a peer-training manner to enhance their working competences in CAT.
(2) A Glossary of Training Items and best practices for CAT for VET; It was a direct result of the Training course that introduced key concepts and suggested working tools to effectively conveying them to tourism workers and students;
(3) A 5-day Study visit in Patras, Greece as a second step after the Training finalized at helping participants relate better what learnt through the training with realistic examples, thus serving the ultimate goal of enhancing Trainers’ competences and training resources in CAT;
(4) A Destination Image Analysis Tool – DIATool: developed by InterCAT consortium in form of an Observation Template that was used and tested during the Study Visit in Patras to record and analyze distinctive local features, progressive models, new trends or technological responses.
Start date 01-12-2020 – End date 30-11-2022
Programme: Erasmus+ – Project Reference: 2020-1-IT01-KA202-008596
Key Action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices
Action type: Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training
Awarded as Good Practice
Website: http://intercaterasmus.eu/
PARTNERSHIP
New Horizons (Italy), Coordinator
Ecological Future Education (Latvia)
ERGASIA EKPAIDEFTIKI ANONYMI ETAIRIA (Greece)
FUNDACION UNIVERSITAT JAUME I-EMPRESA (Spain)
Previform – Laboratório, Formação, Higiene e Segurança do Trabalho, Lda (Portugal)
Link to the Project card on Erasmus+ Results Platform.