Botho University, Botswana and the Duale Hochschule Baden Württemberg (DHBW) in Lörrach, Germany developed a Technology Integrated Module for Sustainable Tourism Education: Synergizing Expertise from Botswana and Germany. The Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University (DHBW) is the first state dual, ie practice-integrated, university in Germany. It was founded on March 1, 2009 and continues the dual model of the former Baden-Württemberg Cooperative Education Academy, which has been successful for over 40 years. The collaboration aims to draw on the respective expertise of Botho University, Botswana and the DHBW Lörrach to create joint, market relevant curricula content for sustainable tourism education. The proposed module will become a regular part of the tourism curricula in both countries, using innovative digital technologies, and involving work on real life Community Based Tourism (CBT) projects in Botswana and Germany.
Module delivery will require that faculty staff and students from both universities spend a one-week period abroad at the partner university each year. Five BU staff visited Germany from the 2nd to 10th of April 2022. In the same vein five DHBW staff members will be visiting from the 10th – 17th of July 2022 with the 13 th being earmarked for familiarisation visit as shown in the itinerary schedule below. As part of student learning, the universities, with the assistance from BTO and the Community Based Natural Resource Management department, chose to work with two communities, one of which is Malaka. The community will benefit expertise from the two universities in form of developmental ideas as well as research. Botho University and DHBW will be co-teaching the module Destination Management using the Community projects as live case studies. Students from both institutions will be actively involved in collecting data to appreciate the organisational structure, operations, success and challenges faced by the communities. The students will gain insights into the characteristics, opportunities, as well as constraints facing CBT projects in their counterpart’s country and will work together to find suitable solutions. In addition to academic and vocational learning, this cooperation will improve soft skills such as intercultural competence, global leadership and teamwork.
List of Team Members
Botho
