Browsing by Author "Schott, C."

Now showing 1 - 12 of 12

Open Access
Academic agency and leadership in Tourism higher education
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2013) Schott, C.
This paper explores the leadership agency of tourism faculty in higher education and recommends actions to enhance leadership for social change. Based on a review of literature grounded within an agency perspective, a conceptual framework is presented that identifies systemic and individual influences on leadership. Three types of freedom for faculty to engage in leadership behaviors arise: (1) the capacity of the individual to lead; (2) the freedom afforded by the organizational context to lead in accordance with one’s capacity to lead; and (3) the social freedom to lead derived from each faculty member’s disciplinary and departmental norms and structures.
Open Access
Critical relationship between climate change awareness and action: An origin-based perspective
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2012) Schott, C.
While it is now widely accepted by scientists and governments that human activity contributes to climate change, there is a lack of understanding whether this realisation is now gaining greater attraction with the general public than it had 5 or 10 years ago. Additional gaps in knowledge relate to the link between awareness and action, which could be hypothesised to have become stronger in light of evidence being produced of some projected climate changes occurring already. This article examines climate change awareness and the link with travel-related decision-making by adopting an under-utilised origin perspective in Wellington, New Zealand. The ﬁndings, generated by a household mail survey, indicate that the majority of the respondents are aware of tourism’s contribution to climate change and think that it is likely that their lives in New Zealand will be negatively affected by climate change. However, when examining the respondents’ recent holiday decision-making, it is evident that for the overwhelming majority, climate change awareness does not appear to inﬂuence travel-related decisions. This article concludes by discussing demand-focused measures aimed at reducing the GHG emissions generated by tourism.
Open Access
Digital Immersion for Sustainable Tourism Education: A roadmap to virtual fieldtrips
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2015) Schott, C.
Fieldtrips have been an important component of a range of educational disciplines for many decades and the associated pedagogies of active and experiential learning have been promoted since the early 1900s. Active learning, which is an integral part of fieldtrips has been found to act as a valuable means of engaging students with the subject, enhancing student’s subject knowledge and understanding, and developing lifelong learners. Fieldtrips additionally allow for a concept or topic to be examined in its social, cultural, environmental and political context, thus creating a space for situated learning, which is recognised to assist in crystallising learning outcomes for students. The merit of fieldtrips to learn about complex topics, such as sustainable tourism development is thus well established. However, today’s teaching and learning budgets are constrained and students are less able to pay for fieldtrips in the face of steadily increasing tuition costs in most countries than they may have been in the past. As a consequence, the tradition of fieldtrips has become less common despite its recognised educational value. In response, this book chapter presents a learning tool which provides a trade-off between the benefits and drawbacks of the comparatively affordable ‘one dimensional’ text based case study and the rich, authentic, but increasingly less accessible multi-dimensional experience of a real fieldtrip - a digital immersion (virtual) fieldtrip.
Open Access
Domestic vs. outbound booking and channel choice behaviour : Evidence from New Zealand
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2011) Schott, C.
Purpose - This paper seeks to analyze the extent to which New Zealand domestic and outbound travelers’ book components of their trip in advance or at their destination and to explore the factors that influence this. Furthermore, the paper compares the distribution channels used by domestic and outbound travelers to purchase different travel products and to examine why these channels have been selected. Design/methodology/approach - The study involves the collection and analysis of data on the profiles, trip characteristics and distribution behavior of domestic and outbound travelers based on a nationwide telephone survey of 1,000 respondents. Findings - Little variation was found in the profile characteristics of domestic and outbound travelers but significant differences occurred in terms of the trip characteristics, the extent of booking in advance and at the destination, reasons why advance bookings were not made, how bookings were made and the channels used all exhibited significant differences according to domestic or outbound travel. This pattern was less consistent with regards to the factors influencing how the bookings were made and the factors affecting channel choice. Research and practical implications - The findings illustrate the complexity of travel decision-making issues, underline the need to take account of differences between domestic and outbound travel and across trip components, and to examine the factors that underlie distribution related behavior. Originality/value - The value and originality of this paper lie in the systematic comparison of the booking and channel choice behavior of domestic and outbound travelers, the search for factors influencing this behavior and a sectoral approach that differentiates transport to and at the destination.
Open Access
Leadership for transformation in tourism education
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2013) Schott, C.
In light of ever greater financial and philosophical attacks on tourism higher education across the world, it is critical to contemplate the role of tourism education at university level and its place in modern societies. This need for reflection is given urgency by increasingly neoliberal education policies, market-driven universities, and ‘consumers’ with distinctive demands that are able to choose from a growing variety of educational ‘products’. Often relegated to an area of specialization within business studies, tourism is increasingly under pressure to demonstrate its value, which is commonly interpreted as producing graduates with industry-ready skills and good immediate job prospects. This focus has led to tourism higher education that seeks to cater to industry needs and is fundamentally vocational. In doing so it is at the mercy of an industry that still largely subscribes to the dream of the self-made leader/entrepreneur, who emerges in a senior managerial position at the end of a career path that starts with washing dishes and/or cleaning toilets, rather than actively promoting and rewarding formal education. This lack of appreciation and support from the industry it seeks to serve presents significant challenges for tourism higher education. Additionally, tourism is also exposed to challenges from within the academy where the above outlined image can lead to tourism programs being looked down upon by other programs and where it is ultimately vulnerable to restructuring and cost cutting measures. However, despite of these profound challenges we believe that tourism higher education delivers a unique and valuable contribution to higher education and that there is thus an urgent need for tourism academics to critically reflect on the status quo, and subsequently act as advocates and agents for transformation of tourism education and research in the academy.
Open Access
Proactive crisis management tools : Ecolabel and Green Globe 21 experiences from New Zealand
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2006) Schott, C.
This article addresses the theme of crisis management in tourism by adopting a proactive rather than a reactive perspective. As such, it examines ecolabels as one of the proactive mitigation mechanisms with the capacity to contribute to the creation of a more sustainable future. Specifically, ecolabels are examined in the context of New Zealand with the aim of providing a better understanding of consumer attitudes and levels of awareness. The findings are generated by a questionnaire survey of international and domestic visitors to Wellington and reveal awareness levels of ecolabels to be small and ecolabel knowledge to be inherently confused. An in-depth examination of the most widely represented ecolabel, Green Globe 21, produced similarly sobering results. However, in the context of previous studies these findings can be regarded as encouraging because the level of awareness reported by international visitors appears to have increased over the last 2 years. Exploring the notion of “greenwash” as a potential inhibitor to greater ecolabel uptake, the majority of respondents report no distrust, thus suggesting that consumer skepticism of ecolabels may be overestimated.
Open Access
Selling adventure tourism : A distribution channels perspective
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2007) Schott, C.
This article examines the distribution channels structure as well as the underlying factors influencing the most prominent channel choices within the adventure tourism industry. It is based on in-depth interviews with adventure tourism operators in Queenstown, New Zealand. The findings suggest that the distribution structure is similar to other attraction sectors and that business size has some bearing on the ‘length’ of the distribution chains. However, regardless of business size the sector places a clear priority on ‘at destination’ distribution and the factors underlying this choice were found to be varied and reflective of both sector-specific demand and supply characteristics.
Open Access
Tourism and climate change : Interrelationships and implications
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2010) Schott, C.
This chapter contextualizes the interrelationships between tourism and climate change and thus provides an introduction to this volume. It commences with a brief but comprehensive overview of the key issues identified by climate change research, including an update since the 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as well as a brief discussion of the latest rounds of climate change negotiations. The pursuing discussion is informed by these points and explores climate change’s indirect and induced impacts on tourism and possible ramifications. Both of these parts highlight behavioral change as a critical factor to both adaptation and mitigation thus motivating the psychological contribution in an effort to shed light on the obstacles to behavioral change. In the concluding section, the chapter synthesizes the discussion grounded in multiple disciplines into a set of research themes that the volume subsequently begins to address.
Open Access
Tourism and climate change : Public and private sector responses in New Zealand
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2010) Schott, C.
While the need to respond to the wide-ranging challenges posed by climate change has been widely emphasized, there is still a relative lack of attention being given to the type, scale, and nature of responses that are taking place in different economic sectors and parts of the world. This chapter provides a review of the tourism-related responses to the implications of climate change in the context of New Zealand. This is a country where tourism is a very important sector of the economy that depends heavily on the credibility of its green and unspoilt destination image. However, due to its relative isolation in the South Pacific, New Zealand requires most international tourists to travel long distances, which results in considerable greenhouse gas emissions. The chapter outlines the private and public sectors’ responses to these challenges with particular attention to their collaboration.
Open Access
Tourism distribution channels : The visitors' perspective
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2005) Schott, C.
This paper extends research on tourism distribution channels, a topic dominated by studies of providers and intermediaries, by addressing the use of multiple channels from the visitors’ perspective. The paper reports the results of intercept surveys of international and domestic independent visitors, and their use of a range of distribution channels to make travel, accommodation, and attractions arrangements at two New Zealand destinations: Rotorua and Wellington. Emphasis is given in turn to the different functions of distribution—information search, booking, and payment—and to the factors that influence the channels selected for each of these functions. Similarities and differences are found among the three sectors and between the destinations and segments analyzed.
Open Access
Travel arrangements and the distribution behaviour of New Zealand outbound travellers
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2009) Schott, C.
This paper contributes to the literature on tourism distribution by examining the distribution behavior of 547 New Zealand outbound travelers segmented by the way in which they have made their travel arrangements: package tourists, independent travelers, and an intermediate group, package plus. The results reveal differences among the three segments in terms of travel characteristics, information search, booking, and purchase, but not profile attributes or the influence of distribution on destination or product choice. Variations are also found in channel behavior across the four different sectors examined: transport to and at the destination, accommodation, and attractions, and activities.
Open Access
Virtual Fieldtrips and Climate Change Education for Tourism Students
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2017) Schott, C.
While the pedagogical benefits of fieldtrips have long been recognised our ever increasing understanding of the impacts of flying on climate change is presenting educators with a poignant dilemma; the many benefits long associated with international fieldtrips are at odds with the world community’s needs in limiting/halting climatic change. In response, the paper presents the concept of a VR-based virtual fieldtrip as an innovative and carbon-sensitive type of (educational) travel. The paper not only makes the case for virtual fieldtrips as a meaningful learning tool but also explores both the virtual fieldtrip’s impact on Greenhouse Gas emissions and climate change-related learning. On both accounts the initial findings in this paper are very encouraging. More in-depth research is now required to not only develop a deeper understanding of the full breadth of benefits, but also of the diverse weaknesses presented by virtual fieldtrips and how to negotiate them.