The Department of Tourism Management houses a dedicated unit to research and networking activities related to the main areas of interest to the Department of Tourism Management.

The Project Unit lead by Ms Heather Mcnamara is responsible for identifying funding opportunities, managing the proposals and coordinating the successful grants from pre-award to the post-award phase. The Projects Unit is also involved in research and networking activities both locally as well as internationally. 

At the present time our Department is involved in a number of projects as well as an ERASMUS MUNDUS programme for a joint Master of Science in Tourism Development and Culture. In the past it worked on an extensive array of EU co-funded projects and activities such as seminars, training programmes and consultancy. Further details on current projects are found below:

Past Projects 

3 ECONOMY+

Erasmus+ is the EU's programme to support education, training, youth and sport in Europe. The 3Economy+ project consists of students exchanges in collaboration with University of Granada (Spain) and the ESTG higher education centre for management in Portalegre (Portugal). It came to an end in August 2020.

The 3Economy+ establishes a curriculum that sets out shared expectations within economy, tourism, and marketing to ensure that the selected students are prepared for enterprise or employment following qualification, or for further study.

The programme promotes open access to materials, documents and media for improving learning, teaching and work opportunities within the fields of business, marketing and tourism, and within multilingual environments. By fostering multilingualism and interculturality among the participants, through the use of English, Spanish and Portuguese, important international geographical areas are covered, contributing to the development of emerging economies.

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BLUESPROUT

Bluesprout is an Erasmus+ project that aims to boost entrepreneurs’ competences, enhance their services and support their competitiveness in marine sector at EU level. Its three specific objectives are to:

• - Improve the institutional ecosystem identifying best practices and replicable models;
• - Train the trainers in order to support entrepreneurs and those seeking to become entrepreneurs in adapting their businesses to current market, where a large part of customers are interested in support environmental-sustainable businesses;
• - Encourage the creation of new businesses focused on blue economy (touristic businesses mainly) with a business model which integrate business competitiveness/growth and environmental protection.

The project is run by Varna Economic Development Agency (Bulgaria), Sociedade Portugesa de Inovacao (Portugal), CBE - Cooperation Bancaire Pour L'Europe (Belgium); FVB in Hive, Ancona (Italy) and ITTC (now Department of Tourism Management) at the UM.

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EU HERITAGE

EU HERITAGE is an Erasmus+ KA2: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices - Sector Skills Alliances project aiming at developing Sector Skills Alliances. It is a three-year project.

EU HERITAGE is a wide transnational initiative bringing together 10 partners from 7 EU countries forming an high quality balanced partnership which includes:

• 4 VET / educational providers: Fondazione Fitzcarraldo (Italy); University of Malta - Institute for Tourism, Travel & Culture (Malta)- (now Department of Tourism Management); Hellenic Open University (Greece); National Institute for Cultural Research and Training - NIRCT (Romania);
• 3 industry / sector representatives in the field of cultural heritage / culture / tourism / creative industries: MATERAHUB (Italy); Alden Biesen (Belgium); Asociation Plataforma La Cultora (Spain);
• 1 research centre and sector representative in the field of Digital & ICTs for cultural heritage, M2C Institut fur angewandte Medienforschung GmbH (Germany)
• 1 European network and sector representative in the field of culture: European Network on Cultural Management and Policy  - ENCACT (Belgium);
• 1 Chamber of Commerce: Camara de Comercio e Industria Italiana para Espana  - CCIS (Spain).

The project aims to:

•          enhance the innovation of the CH sector to make it more sustainable, accessible, audience centered, digitally ready, thus more competitive, resilient and able to cope with the challenges which are affecting the sector;
•          build a strong Sector Skills Alliance for the promotion and valorisation of CH by working on the skills of heritage professionals and with the goal of avoiding a mismatch between the new sector’s needs and the professional skills of heritage professionals, thus:
•          foster the cooperation of the CH sector with other sectors and industries, in particular technology, tourism, SMEs, and Creative and Cultural industries, to allow further scope for creativity, innovation and sustainability.

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FAMOUS

Famous is a COSME project and addresses film tourism. It has just been concluded. It addresses movie-driven tourism in the 21st century. It focus on UNESCO world heritage sites that have hosted film productions in Europe and the Mediterranean. It is a COSME project supported by the EU that looks at Transnational Thematic Tourism Products Linked to Cultural & Creative Industries.

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TOUR DC

TOUR DC is an Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degrees (EMJMD) project. It is international in scope whilst having a strong base in Europe. It has a common and integrated approach manifest in courses that relate to the central objectives of TourDC, complement one another and add distinctive attributes to the academic subject matter. Lecturers from the degree-awarding Consortium Partner Universities (CPUs) of Glasgow, Malta, Lisbon and Lund will contribute to the courses at other CPUs’ campuses, giving a concrete element of jointness and ensuring a continuing exchange of ideas, approaches and topics taught through collaborative teaching arrangements. Furthermore, dissertation supervision will be undertaken by a supervisory team of academics from the respective degree-awarding CPUs. A fifth, non-degree-awarding CPU (Wageningen University) will deliver a Summer School (SSch). The combination of the above aspects makes this interdisciplinary degree exceptional. No other tourism programme offers the depth and breadth covered by TourDC which will equip students for the challenges the industry faces in the future by combining cultural awareness and appreciation with an insight into managing resources, and an understanding of development in a holistic sense. The following elaborates on the integration and objectives of this programme.

The 2yr Master of Science in Tourism Development and Culture draws mainly on the social sciences, including anthropology, economics, environmental science, geography, management studies and sociology; it also contains historical approaches. Current issues including sustainability, cultural conservation, heritage management and destination development are explored by the CPUs, as well as fundamental aspects of social science theory and methodology and more specifically of tourism studies, for instance, typologies of tourists, supply and demand, socio-economic impacts on destinations, innovation in business, managing events and tourism strategies. The student will therefore get a broad introduction to the tourism industry and types of tourists as well as a deeper understanding of contemporary issues relating to the natural, cultural and urban environments and sustainability. Opportunities to hear from professionals in the sector and to undertake work experience are available to enhance the student’s experience, relate theory to practice and develop suitability for the job market. TourDC is taught by European CPUs whose interdisciplinary courses complement each other.

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For further information and proposals submission for cooperation please contact TM Admin