Tourism and Innovation

The Master’s Degree in Tourism and Innovation comes as a result of the need to provide a response to the demands of the market in relation to the challenges that the pandemic brought to professionals in the sector.

Although tourism is one of the industries that has grown most in recent decades and that generates most wealth, it was recently shaken by the pandemic and its effects worldwide, leading to significant changes in consumer behaviour, expectations and demands.  The recent developments and changes show that higher education offerings must necessarily keep pace with circumstantial and sectoral transformations, aiming to contribute to the enhancement of professional skills. In this context, and knowing that human resources are a decisive factor in the competitiveness of tourism companies and destinations, it is vital for higher education in tourism to adjust and provide responses to market dynamics and demands.

The aims defined for the study cycle are part of the IPVC training programme, which includes the tourism area as one of its development priorities. This is where the current study cycle comes in, particularly through using innovative curricular plans and teaching and learning processes that are suited to the different audiences. The increase in competitiveness in the tourism sector at international level forces tourist destinations to have a constant policy of developing its human resources, giving them skills for the development of innovative, socio-professional participation and high added value as a way of ensuring their international competitiveness. More precisely, the Tourism and Innovation study cycle is in line with the institution’s educational, scientific and cultural project, which is aimed at assuring the definition of the training programme through dialogue and important instrumental knowledge for local, regional and national tourism development needs, highlighting the following points:

• The study cycle is organised in such a way as to provide for coherent and consistent integration of master’s degree students into the labour market as they progress to third cycle studies, provided by the institution.
• Proximity with the tourism sector is reinforced through institutional partnerships and contacts both at home and abroad.
• Another aim of this study cycle is to create and maintain applied research projects and service provision in partnership with external bodies that are important for the development of the expertise and techniques that are relevant for their training areas.
• The course units expressly include projects in a real context, study visits, as a knowledge “laboratory” for close contact with the tourism reality in the field, which is important for analysing resources in the region and their potential for tourism.
• Initiatives aimed at raising awareness of the social and ethical responsibility of the institution as an intermediary for the sustained development of the local people.
• Curricular programmes are interconnected to the goals of sustainable development in different areas, including where the institution operates.

Master’s Degree Prospectus