Teaching Tourism Marketing in the Post-covid Era: Evaluating the Virtual Adoption Project
Teaching Tourism Marketing in the Post-covid Era: Evaluating the Virtual Adoption Project

Author(s): Brigitta Pecsek
Subject(s): Tourism, ICT Information and Communications Technologies
Published by: Udruženje ekonomista i menadžera Balkana
Keywords: Teaching tourism marketing; Project-based teaching; Post-covid teaching; Practical experience
Summary/Abstract: This paper analyses a project called Virtual Adoption, initiated by the Department of Tourism at the Eszterházy Károly Catholic University, Hungary with the aim of offering students to work closely with local SMEs during the COVID-19 pandemic. Marketing students follow a practice-oriented curriculum, however, in that case, they could test their knowledge in real-life situations. The hypothesis was that gathering real-life professional experience during critical times could have a multitude of benefits ranging from course commitment to obtaining better grades. This research combined class observation with a short student survey. It was found that participating students were more committed to the course, gained better marks and the dropout rate decreased to zero. The results of the survey pointed out that the benefit of gaining first-hand experience came on top when asked about motivation and experience related to the project. The findings are in line with the arguments of educational scholars calling for more cooperation between education and industry.

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