Beyond adventure GAP year programme: is it successful in training soft skills?

ABSTRACT

Adventure Gap year programmes are becoming popular globally but there is still little research on their contribution to the development of soft skills of the participants. Using the Beyond Adventure Structured Adventure Gap Year Programme in South Africa, this study used a qualitative research approach where semi-structured interviews were conducted with its 15 participants pre-post (before) and post-test (after) their training to establish whether there was an improvement in soft skills. The results show that participants’ facilitation, instructional and organisational skills improved after the Beyond Gap Year training. This study adds to the little research currently found on the potential of Gap year programmes to contribute to soft skills development. The recommendations given may also be useful to the programme designers of the Gap year programmes to improve the content of the programmes for them to fully benefit the participants in developing their soft skills.

KEYWORDS:

• Adventure gap year programme
• adventure tourism
• alternative tourism
• soft skills

Acknowledgments

Beyond Adventure Gap Year programme for the opportunity to use participants for the study and the accommodation provided at each of the scheduled interviews

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Notes on contributors

P van der Merwe

Prof van der Merwe is currently a professor and researcher at the School of Tourism Management at the Faculty of Economic Management Sciences. I form part of the TREES research unit (Tourism Research in Economics, Environs and Society). My main area of research lies in natural-area tourism, which includes ecotourism, wildlife tourism, adventure tourism, and geotourism.

Owen Gohori

Dr Owen Gohori has worked in the tourism industry in Zimbabwe for seven years. He has worked for several tour operators, including one of the leading tour operators in the country during that time, the United Touring Company (UTc), before becoming an entrepreneur. He has vast knowledge and experience working with inbound tourists and promotes the development of community-based tourism (CBT) in rural communities as a strategy to benefit poor local people.

Philip Vosloo

Mr Philip Vosloo is currently the program manager at Wilderness Therapy Namibia and owner of Uplimit teambuilding and leadership development. Philip completed his master’s of commerce in tourism management in 2021 through the North-West University (NWU- Potchefstroom).