Students as Co-Creators of Interdisciplinary Tourism Content: A Strategy to Help Prepare Creative, Problem-solving, Research Savvy, and Globally-Competent Hospitality Employees

ABSTRACT

Tourism is intrinsically interdisciplinary and draws elements from numerous academic fields, but only a small number of foundational disciplines are formally presented to students in undergraduate hospitality and tourism textbooks, namely, introduction to tourism or hospitality, accounting/finance, operations, and marketing. This research explored the effectiveness of broadening the range of disciplines to which students are exposed through the use of a unique final project. Seventy-six students across three academic years were assigned a lesser-covered academic discipline, such as Music or Astronomy, and instructed to explore the intersection of this discipline with tourism to create original in-class presentations. As co-creators of classroom content, students developed and improved their self-directed learning and research skills, multidimensional knowledge and global competency. Results verify the potential of this pedagogical method, one that can easily be adopted and adapted to refocus student efforts on revealing niche tourism amenities in any country or culture.

KEYWORDS:

• Hospitality education
• interdisciplinary tourism education
• niche tourism
• special-interest tourism
• undergraduate research

Introduction

The main objective of this study was to assess the improvement in student perspectives and knowledge regarding how other academic disciplines inform tourism and the effectiveness of adding interdisciplinary content and information to introductory tourism courses via a unique capstone project. Broadening student exposure to linkages between tourism and other academic disciplines is especially important when an introductory tourism course may be a student’s only exposure to how the tourism system acts as an overarching umbrella for the delivery of hospitality. A secondary objective was to present a project that could help students become creative, problem-solving, research savvy and globally-competent hospitality employees.

Literature Review

Tourism is intrinsically interdisciplinary and draws elements from numerous academic fields (Echtner & Jamal, 1997; Gunn, 1991). If the “element of travel [tourism] is to be understood, several disciplines and specialties are implied” (Gunn, 1991). In relation to tourism-related transportation, Gunn listed Political Science, Geography, and Engineering as related disciplines. In relation to travel behavior and visitor activities, Gunn mentioned the importance of Geography, Psychology, Sociology, History, Archeology, and Marketing. Jafari and Brent Ritchie (1981) listed five key foundational academic disciplines important to tourism research: Economics, Sociology, Psychology, Geography, and Anthropology. Darbellay and Stock (2012) refer to four key disciplinary perspectives that have gained traction since the 1950s, namely, Tourism Geography, Tourism Sociology, Tourism Anthropology, and Tourism Economics. A review of tourism doctoral dissertations found linkages to fifteen disciplines (Jafari & Aaser, 1988).

A physical examination of five popular English-language undergraduate introductory tourism textbooks (Cook et al., 2018; Goeldner & Ritchie, 2012; Mill & Morrison, 2012; Morrison et al., 2018; Walker & Walker, 2018) reveals that the five academic disciplines most often presented to students are Economics (in relation to finance and the business of tourism), Psychology and Sociology (in relation to marketing and consumer behavior), Political Science (in relation to tourism policy and laws) and Ecology (in relation to ecotourism). None of the five textbooks adequately showcased the role of Anthropology to tourism studies (Smith, 1977) or the anthropologists who study tourism, like Valene Smith and Dean MacCannell (MacCannell, 1976; Nash, 2007). However, Walker and Walker (2018, pp. 269–270) includes brief mention of tourism and Art and Morrison et al. (2018, p. 20) mention how the architectural designs of buildings, such as hotels, contribute to their becoming local attractions and how Architecture helps or contributes to maintaining unique local heritage (Morrison et al., 2018, p. 135).

Tourism Education Trends

Jamal and Jourdan (2009) argue for interdisciplinary tourism education and stated that the “key challenge lies in sorting out and integrating relevant knowledge from a multitude of disciplines that inform tourism.” More recently, a team of Middle East researchers explored the efficacy of launching an interdisciplinary tourism program “due to the deeply inherited interdisciplinary nature of the tourism industry” (Afifi et al., 2019) and especially in light of the increasing need for hospitality graduates to possess multidimensional knowledge and skill sets. Renfors et al. (2020) discuss the need for a wide range of knowledge and skills to successfully develop tourism destinations.

Traditional classroom structures and passive pedagogical methods are oftentimes ineffective in their ability to prepare creative, problem-solving, socially-engaged and flexible students that today’s employers demand (K. Boluk et al., 2019b). Thus, K. A. Boluk et al. (2019a) recommend an integrated curriculum design (ICD), which steps away from the lecture-based instruction by one teacher and promotes the co-creation of course content with a team of professors from multiple disciplines (i.e., interdisciplinary) and with community partners. ICD can facilitate deep learning as “students realize their ability to drive their learning” (Miller et al., 2019) and trust their own capabilities as they become more challenged, engaged and motivated in the self-directed learning and co-creation process. The value of co-creation is explored by Vespestad and Smørvik (2020) in relation to the teaching-learning relationship and Deale (2020) in relation to “students as researchers” who should be guided to make an “original intellectual or creative contribution to the discipline” (Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR), 2019). Lim (2016) also emphasizes the importance of encouraging creativity in relation to hospitality and tourism education.

Global Studies is another trend in education as a whole that is important to tourism education. For example, students who experience a Semester at Sea (SAS, 2020) not only accrue the huge educational benefit of international travel and intercultural knowledge, but are required to take the voyage’s core course entitled Global Studies, “an integrated, interdisciplinary introduction to each of the countries visited on a given itinerary (Semester at Sea, 2020)” and that gives students “a chance to learn from many of the faculty members and inter-port lecturers (specialists from each country on the voyage itinerary) who have been selected for their specific areas of expertise (Kang, 2018).” But, according to Deale (2018), one does not necessarily need to travel to gain intercultural competence, but rather, the right pedagogical method can help students acquire key competencies in the classroom.

Tourism Industry Trends

After World War II, tourism began to flourish as more and more people started to travel around the world and within their own countries. The establishment of, and improvements in, domestic and international air travel, highways systems, automobiles and buses, roadside accommodations, fast food chains, and big tourism attractions, such as Disneyland, Six Flags, and Universal Studios, led to a form of tourism many scholars call conventional or mass tourism. This form of tourism often involves the organized movements of large groups of travelers to specialized tourist areas, such as seaside resorts, and sometimes to staged settings (Novelli, 2005, p. 9), such as Disneyland or Disney World.

Increasingly, mass tourism is being called into question as not being sustainable, in that it does not always benefit the environmental, social, and economic concerns of host communities (Paris, 2016). The term “alternative tourism” encompasses a whole range of tourism strategies, including ecotourism, soft-tourism, responsible tourism, small-scale tourism, green tourism, etc., that argues for a “new, more socially and ecologically benign alternative to mass tourism development” (Fennell, 2020, p. 9). Other scholars refer to this type of tourism as niche tourism, which refers to the development of “special interest tourism, culture and/or activity-based tourism involving small numbers of tourists in authentic settings” (Novelli, 2005, p. 9). But still other scholars have proposed “differentiating between ‘general’ and ‘special’ interest tourism” (Brotherton & Himmetoğlu, 1997). Although often framed as competing paradigms, there is a way for mass or general tourism and niche or special-interest tourism to coexist and complement each other. For example, cruises and hotels often incorporate niche tourism opportunities into cruise excursions or day trips, and some cruises are organized around a theme, such as jazz, R&B, cooking, history, or even bird watching.

Novelli (2005, p. 9) frames niche tourism components into cultural, environmental, rural, urban and other micro-niches, where the other categories include photographic, small cruise, voluntourism, dark (visitation to places of death and disasters), youth, and transport tourism activities. However, this framework does not capture all of the emerging niche tourism opportunities. No one framework can capture the full measure of the human travel experience, but looking at the intersection of tourism through the lens of academic disciplines, as in this research, can expose a wider range of special-interest or niche tourism activities and sites.

Tourism educational and industry trends suggest hospitality and tourism curricula should incorporate more interdisciplinary, international and special-interest or niche tourism content, encourage self-directed learning and research via the co-creation of original content with the goal for students to gain intercultural and global competencies. In other words, tourism education should adopt pedagogy that focuses on student learning outcomes designed to produce creative, problem-solving, and research savvy employees with interdisciplinary and multidimensional knowledge, as well as increased global competence.

The Example of Literary Tourism

Exploring the intersection of Literature and tourism is a good example of wide range of special-interest and niche tourism activities based on lesser-covered academic discipline for students to research about and present their own original content on.

“Literary tourists” can be effectively delineated into two types, namely, links with authors or the settings of their works (Herbert, 2001). The first type is those literary tourists who visit places related directly to the author’s life, (i.e., birthplace, former home[s], spots where their writings were penned, their gravesite) and the second type is those literary tourists who visit places of the author’s inspiration (i.e., settings historically woven into the storyline, landscapes described by the author, or paths of character travels).

In England, prime examples of tourism in relation to author’s lives include Shakespeare’s birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon and the Globe Theater in London, the home of Jane Austen in the city of Bath, and properties of world-famous Peter Rabbit children’s book author Beatrix Potter. Tourism sites in Beatrix Potter’s Lake District include her Hill Top Farm, which she bought in 1905 with the royalties from her first few books to help preserve the landscape from rampant development (Squire, 1994). Dove Cottage, the country home of British Romantic poet William Wordsworth, is another popular literary tourism destination in the Lake District.

In Ireland, County Sligo, with its breathtaking mountain scenery, lakes, and waterfalls, is known as “Yeats Country.” Sligo’s western landscape and Gaelic-speaking people inspired many of the great works of the Nobel Prize-winning Irish writer William Butler Yeats. Yeats Country is where many tourists go in search of the “real” Ireland (Tracy, 2001). Back in Dublin, the Winding Stair Bookshop & Café, which sits on the River Liffey, is a famous landmark and watering hole named for a Yeats poem of the same name (Yeats, 1933). Additionally, going on a Dublin literary pub crawl (Costello, 1998) is a popular literary tourist activity. Dublin-based literary festivals include Bloomsday, an annual celebration of Ulysses by James Joyce (Joyce, 1922), and the four days and nights of the Bram Stoker Festival, based on the legacy of Dublin horror novelist and Dracula author (Bram Stoker Festival, 2020).

In the United States, the homes and estates of celebrated authors such as Mark Twain, Edgar Allen Poe, Pearl S. Buck, Ernest Hemingway, Henry David Thoreau, and Zora Neale Hurston, to name a few, are open for visitation. Many sites have been designated national historic sites or have associated heritage trails and festivals, such as the Zora! Festival in Eatonville, Florida (Rivera et al., 2008).

Specific examples of tourism related to storylines or settings include the balcony in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet in the city of Verona, Italy, which is designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site, places in Paris and other European cities from The DaVinci Code (Brown, 2003), authentic settings from Anne of Green Gables novels (Gothie, 2016; Montgomery, 1908) on Prince Edward Island in Canada, all of which are promoted for tourism. The House of the Seven Gables, made famous by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel of the same name (Hawthorne, 1851) is 1668 gloomy Colonial mansion in Salem, Massachusetts, named for its gables. The house, its beautiful gardens, and outbuildings are now open for tourism.

But literary tourism in not limited to better-known or English-language authors.

For example, the windswept seaside town of Concarneau in Brittany, France, the setting of The yellow dog (Simenon, 1967; Simenon & Aymé, 1936;), has been explored for the novel’s impact on tourism development and the establishment of an annual literary festival by the locals (Mansfield, 2015). A recent study on literary tourism (Jenkins & Lund, 2019) includes case studies on Brazil, Lithuania, India, Italy, Wales, and three UNESCO Cities of Literature: Edinburgh, Barcelona, and Óbidos (Portugal). African literary tourism has also been explored, especially in regard to Cry, The Beloved Country (Paton, 1948; Stiebel, 2004) and South African Indian writers in Durban (Stiebel, 2010).

Methodology

Especially when hospitality majors are unable to participle in a travel aboard experience, such as a Semester at Sea or in a land-based experience in a foreign country, and/or when the co-creation of courses among professors from different disciplines (Boluk et al., 2019a) is not practical or cannot be effectively accomplished in the available timeframe, this study looked at the effectiveness of adding interdisciplinary and international material to an introductory tourism course through the deployment of a unique capstone final project. The final project was also a vehicle for students to become self-directed learners, student researchers, and co-creators of original content that increased their own knowledge and exposed fellow classmates to a wide range of special-interest and niche tourism activities based on lesser-covered academic disciplines.

The academic disciplines most often included in introduction tourism textbooks (Economics, Psychology, Sociology, Political science, Ecology), plus Anthropology, were covered in class, so were not assigned to students as presentation topics. During the 2009–2010 academic year (AY), a pilot study was conducted in two 100-level tourism courses for which a convenience sample of all students (Class A: n = 16 and Class B: n = 13) were assigned one of thirteen academic discipline to investigate how that discipline intersects with and informs tourism. The initial list of academic disciplines was subjectively chosen based on the author’s first-hand knowledge of tourism activities and opportunities derived from two undergraduate degrees in science, eight years as a science editor, a decade as a food and travel editor, and reinforced with a PhD in cultural heritage tourism. The initial thirteen academic disciplines were Architecture, Agriculture, Archeology, Bacteriology, Ecology, Engineering, Geography, History, Journalism, Marine biology, Music, Religion, and Technology.

For this extended research paper, the initial list of academic disciplines was increased to twenty-two. Additions were based on lessons learned from the pilot study, as well as the author’s first-hand knowledge. For example, students found Technology and Engineering a bit amorphous, so those disciplines were dropped, while Volcanology and Ornithology were added with success. The final list of disciplines for this research, in alphabetical order, were Agriculture, Archeology, Architecture, Art/art history, Astronomy, Bacteriology/virology, Computer science/IT, Ecology, Engineering, Geography, History, Journalism, Literature, Marine biology, Medicine, Music, Ornithology, Paleontology, Psychology, Religion, Space science, and Volcanology.

Class size in any given year determined whether students were assigned their discipline as individuals or in pairs. Assignment of disciplines was by lottery (i.e., students randomly picked their discipline), but students were allowed to trade disciplines with any other willing student(s). To eliminate any anxiety in having to choose a presentation day or jockeying for the perceived perfect presentation time slot, the assigned discipline automatically determined the date and sequence of their presentation.

To model the rigor, format, and expected content for in-class presentations, a lecture on literary tourism (as discussed in the literature review) was presented by the author and made available to students as a resource. The guidelines for preparing in-class PowerPoint presentations were to 1) clearly define the assigned academic discipline, 2) define the intersection of the assigned discipline with tourism, 3) research, discover, and report on tourism activities related to the discipline, including tourism attractions, facilities and types of tourists, 4) include at least one concrete international example of a tourism-related activity or opportunity and 5) find and report on an associated scholarly or educational conference as defined by an online agenda or Call for Papers. The fourth requirement served to add a Global Studies or international example to the presentation.

A draft outline was due about one month prior to the presentation date. This required students to start their research early and not wait until the last minute. If the review of the draft outline revealed deficiencies in content, students were guided to add extra material and/or instructed to research and present specific sites, attractions, and iconic figures associated with tourism in relation to their discipline. In preparing their presentations, students were instructed to use the Destination Mix (Mill & Morrison, 2012, p. 126; Morrison et al., 2018, p. 215) as a prompt and guide.

Students were also instructed to not solely rely on the internet for information gathering, but were guided how to access key scholarly databases and journals to find current information on the intersection of their assigned discipline with tourism, to save articles to reference management tools and to create APA-style citations. These tasks were also designed to not only improve student presentations, but to increase information literary and raise their comfort level in accessing professional-level resources. Some years, the students were also assigned a tandem five-page final paper that was to mirror and expand on the content of the presentation. Bonus points were awarded for including APA-style references, not just URLs.

Data Collection and Analysis

Data in the form of self-assessments from a convenience sample of 76 students in three 100-level tourism courses across three academic years (Class C, AY 2015–2016: n = 30, Class D, AY 2016–2017: n = 23 and Class E, AY 2017–2018: n = 23) was collected and analyzed. For all three years, students were a mix of traditional incoming freshmen and third-year transfer students. The gender breakdown was 50 females and 26 males.

In the first week of class, students were given time to complete a pre-presentation self-assessment to determine their baseline knowledge about how twenty-two academic disciplines intersect with tourism with the following instructions: Tell me what you know about how each academic discipline intersects with tourism (i.e., each discipline x tourism) … do not use any research tools such as online search, etc.). After each of the in-class presentations had taken place, students were given time to complete a post-presentation self-assessment of their updated or final knowledge in relation to each of the twenty-two disciplines. This method resulted in pairs of observations for each student. Because Class C, D, and E were not equal in size, not all disciplines were presented in each class.

After collecting handwritten self-assessments in AY 2015–2016, in order to collect more manageable and readable digitized entries, data collection for AY 2016–2017 and AY 2017–2018 was conducted during a monitored class period. Students were asked to bring their laptops to class, to complete the assessments in Microsoft Word, and to upload the forms to the university’s Learning Management System. Students were instructed not to consult the internet while inputting their assessments, i.e., no mobile phone use was allowed.

Two panelists independently scored pre-presentation (baseline) and post-presentation (final) student statements, i.e., 76 pairs of observations, with the use of a grading rubric (see, Table 1) by giving each statement a score from 0–3. The mean and median of the panelist’s combined scores for each of the paired statements was calculated in Excel (see, Table 2) to report differences. Because the student statements and related panelist scores came from the same participants, it was determined that their mean differences would be quantitatively analyzed with either a paired samples t-test or Wilcoxson Signed-Rank Test (depending on the normal or non-normal distribution of the mean scores) to determine whether the mean differences between two sets of observations is zero or significantly different. The stated null and research hypothesis were:

H₀: There will be no difference between the population means of the pre- (baseline) and post- (final) assessments.

H₁: There will be a positive and significant difference between the population means of pre-(baseline) and post- (final) assessments.

Table 1. Grading rubric for assessing the level of baseline and final knowledge in relation to the intersection of tourism with various foundational disciplines.

Score	0	1	2	3
Demonstratedlevel of understanding	Claims NO knowledge of intersection or has NO knowledge	Defines the intersection, but no concrete information beyond that, NO examples of general tourist activities	Increased knowledge with mention of examples of general tourist activities, but NO examples of specific attractions/sites, facilities or iconic figures where activities take place	More-detailed explanation of the intersection and activities with at least ONE specific example of an attraction/site, facility, or iconic figure associated with tourism in relation to the discipline in question, especially international

Table 2. Descriptive statistics (mean and median) of combined panelist’s scores for baseline and final assessments for 22 disciplines across three AYs.

	Discipline	Variables	N	Mean	Median
Pair 1	Agriculture	Agro_Base	76	1.10	1
		Agro_Final	76	1.96	2
Pair 2	Archeology	Ruin_Base	76	0.91	0.75
		Ruin_Final	76	1.91	2
Pair 3	Architecture	Arch_Base	76	1.53	1.5
		Arch_Final	76	2.48	3
Pair 3	Art/Art History	Art_Base	76	1.44	1.5
		Art_Final	76	2.41	2.75
Pair 5	Astronomy	Astro_Base	76	0.80	0.5
		Astro_Final	76	2.07	2
Pair 6	Bacteriology/Virology	Bact_Base	76	0.79	0.5
		Bact_Final	76	1.93	2
Pair 7	Computer Science/IT	CompIT_Base	23	0.81	0
		CompIT_Final	23	1.11	1.5
Pair 8	Ecology	Eco_Base	53	0.65	0.5
		Eco_Final	53	1.84	2
Pair 9	Engineering	Eng_Base	46	0.86	1
		Eng_Final	46	1.49	1.5
Pair 10	Geography	Geo_Base	46	1.34	1.5
		Geo_Final	46	2.13	2
Pair 11	History	Hist_Base	76	1.34	1
		Hist_Final	76	2.32	2
Pair 12	Journalism	Journ_Base	46	1.22	1.5
		Journ_Final	46	1.85	2
Pair 13	Literature	Lit_Final	46	0.91	0.5
		Lit_Base	46	2.25	2
Pair 14	Marine Biology	Mbio_Base	76	1.17	1.5
		Mbio_Final	76	2.13	2
Pair 15	Medicine	Med_Base	30	0.80	0.5
		Med_Final	30	2.03	2
Pair 16	Music	Music_Base	76	1.59	1.5
		Music_Final	76	2.43	2
Pair 17	Ornithology	Orni_Base	76	0.45	0
		Orni_Final	76	1.96	2
Pair 18	Paleontology	Palen_Base	46	0.63	0.5
		Palen_Final	46	1.91	2
Pair 19	Psychology	Psych_Base	46	0.98	1
		Psych_Final	46	1.53	2
Pair 20	Religion	Rel_Base	76	1.68	1.5
		Rel_Final	76	2.53	3
Pair 21	Space Science	Space_Base	76	0.78	.25
		Space_Final	76	2.18	2
Pair 22	Volcanology	Vulcan_Base	76	1.07	0.5
		Vulcan_Final	76	2.39	2.5

The null hypothesis would be rejected if the difference between population means is statistically significant enough not to have been a chance result (i.e., p ≤ .05). A positive and significant difference will be considered an indication of significant student learning outcome.

Results

The mean and median of combined panelist’s scores for baseline and final assessments for twenty-two academic disciplines is reported in Table 2. The creation of histograms from the raw mean scores for each discipline revealed a non-normal distribution, thus the Wilcoxson Signed-Rank Test in SPSS was used to calculate mean rank and sum of ranks for each discipline.

The observations for each variable are split into three types depending on whether the value of final scored student assessments is less than baseline assessments (negative ranks), the value of final scored student assessments is greater than baseline assessments (positive ranks), and finally, where both variables take the same value (ties). The positive ranks were greater than the negative ranks across all twenty-two academic disciplines, which means that overall final scored student assessments were higher than baseline assessments. Table 3 reports the mean ranks and sum of ranks for both the negative and positive ranks for each of the six representative academic disciplines highlighted in the discussion.

Table 3. Mean ranks and sum of ranks for pairs of observations for six representative academic disciplines discussed in the results.

	Discipline	Ranks	N	Mean Rank	Sum of Ranks
Pair 1	Agriculture	Negative Ranks	9	37.78	340.00
		Positive Ranks	97	54.96	5331.00
		Ties	46
		Total	152
Pair 3	Architecture	Negative Ranks	10	31.45	314.50
		Positive Ranks	91	53.15	4836.50
		Ties	50
		Total	152
Pair 6	Bacteriology/Virology	Negative Ranks	6	45.00	270.00
		Positive Ranks	110	59.24	6516.00
		Ties	36
		Total	1152
Pair 16	Music	Negative Ranks	8	25.50	204.00
		Positive Ranks	87	50.07	4356.00
		Ties	57
		Total	1152
Pair 17	Ornithology	Negative Ranks	4	14.00	56.00
		Positive Ranks	120	64.12	7694.00
		Ties	28
		Total	152
Pair 18	Paleontology	Negative Ranks	2	16.00	32.00
		Positive Ranks	73	38.60	2818.00
		Ties	17
		Total	92

Table 4 reports the test statistics of the subsequent analysis of the differences in mean ranks (excluding ties) done to establish whether this difference is significant or not. These test statistics are reported as Z scores with accompanying p values. The test statistics clearly demonstrate that there were positive and significant student learning outcomes, i.e., significant improvement in student perspectives and overall knowledge from the time of the baseline assessments to the final assessments, in relation to all twenty-two academic disciplines, except for Pair 7, Computer Science/IT (Mean Difference = 0.20, Z = −1.681, p = .093). Although positive ranks for Computer Science/IT were greater than negative ranks, the difference was not significant.

Table 4. Wilcoxson signed-ranked test Z-score and p value for 22 disciplines across three AYs.

	Discipline	Z score	p value
Pair 1	Agriculture	−8.139	.000
Pair 2	Archeology	−7.785	.000
Pair 3	Architecture	−7.819	.000
Pair 4	Art/Art History	−8.025	.000
Pair 5	Astronomy	−8.973	.000
Pair 6	Bacteriology/Virology	−8.809	.000
Pair 7	Computer Science/IT	−1.681	.093
Pair 8	Ecology	−7.699	.000
Pair 9	Engineering	−4.229	.000
Pair 10	Geography	−6.329	.000
Pair 11	History	−8.807	.000
Pair 12	Journalism	−5.315	.000
Pair 13	Literature	−7.438	.000
Pair 14	Marine Biology	−8.205	.000
Pair 15	Medicine	−5.892	.000
Pair 16	Music	−7.930	.000
Pair 17	Ornithology	−9.885	.000
Pair 18	Paleontology	−7.576	.000
Pair 19	Psychology	−4.395	.000
Pair 20	Religion	−7.291	.000
Pair 21	Space Science	−9.389	.000
Pair 22	Volcanology	−8.976	.000

When looking back at class notes, it was confirmed that Computer Science/IT was not assigned as a discipline for in-class presentations in any of the two years it was included in discipline choices, nor was it covered in class by this author. Thus, students were not exposed to the experimental condition of listening to an in-class presentation on the topic. Since it was not removed from the discipline list for student pre- and post-assessments, this may explain the non-significant outcome.

In addition to being quantitively scored for analysis with the Wilcoxson Signed-Rank Test, the aggregated post-presentation (final) statements from all 76 students were analyzed with Wordle software to create Word Clouds. Since Word Clouds are based on the frequency count of words in a document, they are intrinsically quantitative, but because the software creates a graphic illustration of the word frequency by generating bigger word bubbles or tags for those words used with greater frequency, they are also qualitative in nature.

Discussion

In order to more fully illustrate the power of using this unique final project to spark student engagement, creativity and the co-creation of content from self-directed learning, a more-detailed discussion of in-class presentations for Agriculture, Architecture, Archeology/Paleontology, Music, Ornithology and Bacteriology/virology follows.

Agriculture

The intersection of Agriculture and tourism is most often referred to as agritourism. Agritourism merits a separate tourism course, but in lieu of this, student presentations gave an overview of this important and growing form of tourism. One student pair identified two types of agritourism: tourism related to sites of food production and non-food production. Tourism to vineyards, wineries, farms and orchards, wine tastings and wine tourism in the Napa and Sonoma valleys of California, home stays on farms, picking blueberries and peaches, visiting pumpkin patches and apple orchards, and attending apple festivals in the fall are related to food production. Tourism to tulips fields in Holland or public gardens such as Kew Gardens outside London are forms of non-food production agritourism. Other European agritourism examples include Italian agritourismo at vineyards with villas for accommodations and stays in traditional Austrian farmhouses and in gites in France, which are that country’s main venues for agritourism. Agritourism serves as a base for culinary tourism and farm-to-table experiences, as farms grow and supply ingredients to restaurants. More and more people are incorporating some culinary or gastronomic element into their travel plans (Bessière, 1998; Long, 2004) and food is “becoming recognized as being expressive of identity and culture” (Hall & Sharples, 2003, p. 5).

Significant student learning outcomes in relation to Agriculture (Mean Difference = 0.86, Z = −8.139, df = 150, p = .000) were demonstrated (see, Table 4, Pair 1). Additionally, the visualization of all final statements into Word Clouds (see, Figure 1) revealed that the words “farms” and “farmers” featured prominently, but that students also understood that agritourism can take place at vineyards and wineries.

Figure 1. Word Cloud of agriculture final assessment statements for AY 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 in relation to the intersection of agriculture with tourism; created at Wordle.com.

Architecture

Regarding the intersection of Architecture with tourism, in the “The Tourist Gaze,” Urry (2002) argues that architects and architectural practices are of major importance in shaping the contemporary tourist gaze. In other words, visually distinctive environments, such as those with iconic buildings and bridges, are more often visited. Urry’s examples include India’s Taj Mahal, Spain’s Alhambra (a palace and fortress complex located in Granada) and San Francisco’s Bay Bridge. All student presenters assigned to Architecture were guided to research and include a discussion about the “Bilbao Effect,” sometimes referred to as the “Guggenheim Effect.” This scholarly topic is primarily discussed in architectural and urban planning circles and has come to mean increased tourism associated with the construction of architectural icons. The term arose after the construction of architect Frank Gehry’s contemporary Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain (Plaza, 2000a, 2000b), which had 1.17 million guests in 2019. More recently, the Bilbao effect example has fostered a discussion on the potential of return on investment related to flagship architectural projects (Grodach, 2010; Plaza, 2006). However, although the Bilbao Effect has been mentioned in scholarly tourism articles (Plaza, 2006; Weidenfeld, 2010), and the topic of architectural tourism has fostered scholarly conference papers (Specht, 2009) and books (Ockman & Frausto, 2005; Specht, 2014), the topic is not included in any of the five tourism textbooks examined for this research. Thus, this is a perfect example of the extension of knowledge garnered through this unique final project.

Significant student learning outcomes in relation to Architecture (Mean Difference = 0.95, Z = −7.819, df = 150, p = .000) were demonstrated (see, Table 4, Pair 3). Additionally, the visualization of all final student assessments into Word Clouds (see, Figure 2) revealed that the city of Bilbao (Spain) was most associated with architectural tourism in relation to the city’s Guggenheim Museum (see, Figure 2). The other key European architectural attraction was the Eiffel Tower (Paris); the top-mentioned destination for architectural tourism was Rome.

Figure 2. Word Cloud of architecture final assessment statements by AYs 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 students in relation to the intersection of architecture and tourism; created at Wordle.com.

Paleontology

Over the years, several changes to the overall assignment were made based on lessons learned. For example, student in-class presentations on Archeology, the study of the human past through the lens of human-made tangible material objects, often incorrectly included information about Paleontology, the study of prehistoric nonhuman life forms, often in the form of fossils, most notably dinosaurs. Thus, although Archeology and Paleontology were still assigned together for in-class presentations, students were guided to explore and clarify differences between the two disciplines in their presentations. Most of the students enjoyed learning that Paleontology is intrinsically connected to dinosaurs, and that while dinosaur digs are sometimes open to tourists, museums are the main venue for tourists to intersect with paleontological objects.

Significant student learning outcomes in relation to Paleontology (Mean Difference = 1.28, Z = −7.576, df = 150, p = .000) were demonstrated (see, Table 4, Pair 18). Additionally, the visualization of all final statements into Word Clouds (see, Figure 3) revealed that students correctly identified the dinosaur and dinosaur fossils (as opposed to human remains or human-made artifacts) as the main tourism attraction in relation to Paleontology and museums as a key venue for this tourism activity.

Figure 3. Word Cloud of Paleontology final assessment statements by AYs 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 students in relation to intersection of paleontology with tourism; created at Wordle.com.

Music

Music is the science and art of ordering tones or sounds to produce the elements of rhythm, melody, harmony, and color. Music is part of every country and culture around the globe. Musical tourists can be divided into those who travel to visit sites associated with the lives of iconic musicians, such as where they lived and recorded their music, and those who travel primarily to attend concerts and music festivals. One of the most popular music tourism destinations in the world is the Abbey Road crossing in London where the Beatles photographed the cover image for their Abbey Road album. Another highly visited music tourism spot in the United Kingdom is the Glastonbury Festival, considered the mother of all music festivals. In the United States, Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” and Alicia Keys and Jay-Z’s song, “Empire State of Mind” moves tourists to visit the city and the state to see its beauty. Las Vegas hosts tourists coming to listen live to their favorite musical artists perform. In the California desert near Palm Springs, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, also known as Coachella, draws huge crowds each year. The American cities of Memphis, Nashville, and New Orleans are known for attracting music enthusiasts to listen to music and explore historical musical venues. Memphis, often described as the home of the blues and the birthplace of rock and roll, is home to Graceland, the home of Elvis Presley and Sun Studio, where Elvis recorded twenty-four of his hit songs. Both venues offer tours.

As a measure of the rising interest in musical tourism among scholars, a prominent tourism journal dedicated a special issue to music and tourism (Lashua et al., 2014), which explored marketing musicscapes, busking, and blues tourism. To be next held in Cleveland, Ohio, in September 2021, the Music Tourism Convention brings together the music and tourism sectors to explore how music impacts, benefits, and improves tourism offers, from festivals to heritage, music trails to food and music partnerships.

Significant student learning outcomes for Music (Mean Difference = 0.84, Z = −7.930, df = 150, p = .000) were demonstrated (see, Table 4, Pair 16). Additionally, the visualization of all final statements into Word Clouds (see, Figure 4) revealed that students correctly mentioned specific music tourism activities and venues, including festivals, concerts, and cities of music. As millennials, it was not surprising that many of the students mentioned Coachella in their statements, but they also bridged the generations by mentioning iconic musical artists and musicians like the Beatles and Elvis Presley.

Figure 4. Word Cloud of music final assessment statements by AYs 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 students in relation to the intersection of music with tourism; created at Wordle.com.

Ornithology

One of the most significant student learning outcomes (Mean Difference = 1.51, Z = −9.885, df = 150, p = .000) was in relation to the discipline of Ornithology (see, Table 4, Pair 17). Baseline assessments reveal that a majority of students did not know the meaning of the word “ornithology,” which is the study of birds. Initially, students voiced skepticism about there being any tourism activities in relation to ornithology. However, the wide range of “avi-tourism” activities was quickly revealed, including bird watching around the globe, trips to witness the Sand Hill Crane migration on the Platte River in Nebraska, birding festivals, bird counts at Cape May, New Jersey, expeditions to the Antarctic to see penguins, cruises to the Galapagos to see Darwin’s finches, as well as tourism to museums or museum collections dedicated to birds.

Bacteriology/Virology

Lastly, even before COVID-19, presentations on the intersection Bacteriology/virology with tourism were engaging and significant student learning outcomes (Mean Difference = 1.14, Z = −8.809, df = 150, p = .000) were demonstrated (see, Table 4, Pair 6). Although the student presenters needed a little guidance on what were the key points, they eventually realized that “disease-free” destinations were more attractive than those with publicized outbreaks. Examples of diseases that negatively impacted the intention to travel included the 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in Hong Kong (Pine & McKercher, 2004), ongoing malaria and Ebola outbreaks in Africa (Novelli et al., 2018) and Montezuma’s revenge in Mexico.

Presentations also addressed the potential spread of disease from destinations to home countries because of the ease of modern-day global travel and the wisdom or requirement of acquiring vaccinations before traveling to some countries. This topic strikes home in relation to the current COVID-19 pandemic. According to Chen et al. (2022), “COVID-19 has devastated China’s current socio-economic tourism system. It is estimated that in the whole year of 2020, the internal tourism revenue will fall by 20.6% over the previous year.” In 2018, China generated about $40B USD from international tourists (Statista, 2020); however, Chen et al. (2022) do not mention the negative impact on less inbound international tourism to China and how or if destinations that rely on Chinese tourists will be negatively impacted. However, Euromonitor travel data conservatively projects a 10.3% decline in tourism arrivals to China for 2020 and a 16% decline in Chinese outbound departures for 2020 (S. Gavin, Euromonitor, Senior Business Development Account Associate, personal communication, July 21, 2020).

Conclusion

This unique capstone final project was an effective and engaging way to give hospitality students an appreciation for the interdisciplinarity of tourism, as well as the breadth and depth of the tourism system, the silent network that works to make hospitality attractions and facilities (especially museums as the repositories of tangible material culture) into successful destinations. This pedagogical method helped internationalize the curriculum and helped students become aware of a vibrant world of niche tourism or special-interest tourism activities and venues, information they will carry into the hospitality industry as hosts and use when they are guests themselves. This capstone project helped prepare students to enter the hospitality workplace as more creative, problem-solving, research savvy and globally-competent employees.

This instructional method reinforced problem-solving skills. Oftentimes, when confronted with their assigned academic discipline, students initially voiced concerns about whether they would find any associated tourism activity to report in their presentations (i.e., solve the problem put before them). But the in-class sample lecture on literary tourism, which modeled the expected text and image content requirements, coupled with a thorough step-by-step overview of requirements, helped students understand how to successfully gather and organize information from various disparate sources into a coherent PowerPoint presentation of their own (i.e., problem-solving achieved). Ultimately, codifying their research by visually illustrating tourism activities associated with their assigned academic discipline with the creation of a PowerPoint, students became co-creators of original content, and thus, made an original and creative intellectual contribution to the classroom. Also, extra points were awarded for creative presentation titles.

This pedagogical method required that students become self-directed learners and researchers (i.e., research savvy). To strengthen their research skills and techniques, students were shown how to access scholarly databases and journals, to archive articles and save citations to a reference management platform (either EndNote or RefWorks) and to create APA style citations.

To increase global competency, presentations were required to contain at least one example of an international tourism activity associated with their discipline. This content was often the most engaging part of any presentation. Student global competency was extended by requiring students to listen to fellow student presentations in order to receive full points for their own.

Part of the class discussion focused on how increased awareness garnered from this exercise can impact destination choice by serving to broaden the pre-trip search when planning vacations, or expand on-the-ground explorations when already in a destination. These new explorations could include attractions and activities beyond the regular mass tourism offerings, whether or not niche tourism activities in the destination become the main purpose of the trip or are added to an itinerary as a secondary reason to travel. Additionally, this exercise encouraged student creativity to help prepare them to play take a role in co-creating tourism offerings and opportunities within the hospitality industry.

This pedagogical method is very versatile and can easily be adapted to include key tourism activities and opportunities in a faculty member’s specific geographic area or academic area of interest. For example, academic institutions in wine-producing areas such as France, Italy, Spain, United States, New Zealand, Australia, Chile, Argentina, and South Africa, could exchange the academic discipline of Agriculture for Enology, the study of wine or winemaking. For those universities that are geographically close to a charismatic flora or megaflora population, such as the redwoods of California, Dendrology, the study of trees, could be included in the list of academic disciplines. In relation to charismatic fauna or megafauna, such as elephants or pandas, if there is a significant zoo, game or nature reserve or natural history museum in the area, Zoology, the study of animals, could be added to the list of academic disciplines. Future lists of academic disciplines could also include Entomology. Entomotourism (Lemelin et al., 2019) includes visits to bee museums, insectariums, and glow worm caves; butterfly congregations, such as monarch overwintering sites at the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in Michoacán, Mexico (Lemelin & Jaramillo-López, 2020), as well as locations for viewing notable dragonfly (Lemelin, 2007) and firefly populations (Hwang et al., 2020).

Limitations

Since instruction and data collection took place in the United States, a key limitation is that the content of student presentations, save for the required concrete international example, for the most part, revealed and explored niche or special interest tourism opportunities in the United States. But the example of literary tourism in the literature review shows how assigning students to explore the intersection of various academic disciplines with tourism can easily be adopted and adapted to refocus student efforts on revealing alternative, niche tourism amenities in any country or culture.

Although significant, engaging and interesting tourism opportunities were discovered and presented in class about each of the academic disciplines, not all of the student learning outcomes have been presented in this paper nor is the extended list of academic disciplines or those recommended for future consideration exhaustive.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).