Cultural Tourism Management

BRIEF COURSE DESCRIPTION
Cultural tourism is a booming sector that is currently undergoing several processes of diversification. Beyond visiting museums or historical monuments, cultural tourism is increasingly based on new cultural and heritage resources, such as intangible heritage. Heritage can be considered as one of the basic resources to elaborate an offer of cultural products, which undoubtedly help improve the competitiveness of the destinations, and differentiate themselves. Cultural tourism management, therefore, can serve as the basis for the creation of a new discourse for destinations. It can also provide key elements of attraction for tourism development. This course is the follow up to the subject "tourism and heritage" and wants to understand the ecosystem of cultural tourism. Students will be able to apply the acquired knowledge in the subject “touristic-cultural mediation”. On the one hand, students will acquire a general understanding of tourism-cultural products and heritage presentation spaces applied to different types of cultural tourism. On the other hand, they will acquire the necessary tools for tourism management and will be able to use them in a sustainable way.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
1. Know and identify the new tendencies in the practice of tourist activities.
2. Know instruments and mechanisms for obtaining financial resources.
3. Use tourism-marketing tools: Revenue Management, e-marketing, web 2.0.
4. Develop skills related to the planning, organization and management of the operation of tourist establishments.
5. Develop skills related to the planning, organization and direction of the operation of tourist establishments.

ACADEMIC CONTENTS
BLOCK 1. Cultural tourism
1.1. Definition of cultural tourism
1.2. Conceptualization of heritage
1.3. Origins and development of cultural tourism
1.4. New trends in cultural tourism
BLOCK 2. Heritage as a resource for cultural tourism
2.1. Cultural heritage national and international organizations and institutions
2.2. Heritage exhibition spaces
2.3. Conversion of cultural resources into tourism experiences
BLOCK 3. Heritage management for tourism and cultural tourism management
3.1. Challenges of heritage management for tourism. Balance between use and conservation
3.2. Keys for the development of cultural tourism projects
3.3. Cultural tourism strategies
3.4. Income generation in heritage spaces
3.5. Communication and commercialization of cultural tourism
 

LEARNING METHODOLOGY
The learning methodologies planned for this subject contemplate different activities that contribute to develop the skills related to this course. Some of the learning activities that will be developed are the following:
• Lectures • Case studies
• Discussions
• Practical exercises
• Problem-based learning

ASSESSMENT SYSTEM
The assessment system measures the student’s achievement of learning outcomes regarding the subject’s competences and contents. Students may choose continuous assessment or single assessment:
Continuous Assessment: the teaching-learning process is assessed by a continuous monitoring of the work done by the students throughout the course and a final individual examination. Students must attend classes in order to be assessed by continuous assessment. Single Assessment: for those students who cannot come to class regularly, they can choose to be assessed by single assessment. The teaching-learning process is assessed by means of the assessment of all activities and in-person individual examination at the end of the course.
To qualify for this form of assessment, students must apply within the first 15 days of the start of the course through the assessment section of Virtual Campus.

The assessment activities planning will be public for the students from the start.
 

To pass the course, it is mandatory to have obtained a minimum final grade of "5", as long as the student has completed the individual exam/s or work/s established in the course. This exam/s or final work/s must be graded with a minimum of "4" in order to be able to calculate the average of all the assessment activities carried out during the course.

Revision and Reassessment of the Course
The student has the right to revise all the evidences that have been designed for the assessment of learning.
If a student fails to achieve the learning objectives of the course, in order to opt for the subject reassessment, it will be necessary to have obtained a final grade of the subject between "4-4.9", and to have attended the individual final exam/s or final work/s of the course.
The reassessment process will only involve the modification of the final grade in the case that the new assessment activity is passed and, in any case, the maximum grade will be "5". This grade will be averaged with the other grades of the assessment activities carried out by the student during the corresponding academic period, considering the percentages established in each subject, setting the final grade for the course.