The Travel Institute Transitions Course Content to Interactive e-Learning Model

The Travel Institute is transitioning its current online educational courses format to an interactive, e-Learning platform, aimed at improving both the student experience and student retention rates.

“Our move to this new platform further demonstrates our focus on supporting student success,” said Diane Petras, CTIE, president, The Travel Institute. “With interactive exercises, increased use of images, enhanced navigation, mapping capabilities, progress quizzes, and much more, we’re blending the capabilities and content we see as most beneficial to travel professionals who want to maximize educational opportunities and advance their career.”

By combining visual, auditory, and experiential learning, students are expected to benefit from improved retention. The new platform also automatically adapts to various screen sizes and orientation, enabling easy transition between desktop, tablet and mobile phone access.

“Taking advantage of today’s best practice Web technologies, The Travel Institute is ensuring our content connects most broadly with various students’ learning styles and, ultimately, that our students experience increased retention of what they’ve learned and are able to then use it in their careers each day,” said Guida Botelho, CTIE, director of training, The Travel Institute.

The new format is currently available for courses on luxury and golf. The multi-lesson Luxury Specialist program focuses on attracting affluent customers and creating itineraries, featuring expert insights, trends, products, and effective selling strategies. The Golf Travel Specialist program covers identifying and qualifying the right clients, suggesting the right areas and attractions that match clients’ lifestyle, interests, and experience. Upon completion of the course, participants take the closed-book exam and earn “Specialist” standing.

Available on May 1, the Northern Europe course is the first in a new 3-part series for Europe, and includes both Scandinavia and The British Isles. It features new and updated content from sample itineraries, key landmarks and attractions, tips for traveling in the region, cultural nuances, language, seasons, dress, customs, currency, and much more, for both urban and remote areas. Travel professionals will also gain specific sales tips and niche market advice. The course is available now for pre-order.

In addition, the newly refreshed Certified Travel Associate (CTA) curriculum will be available on July 1. The new program was written by subject matter experts and covers 15 critical areas of study designed to teach travel agents how to become travel professionals. Students can further supplement the CTA program with After Hours study groups and certification test prep options, including student mentoring.

Additional courses including Alaska, the Caribbean, Hawaii, Italy, Mexico and North America are in the queue, with all courses scheduled for migration to the new platform by the end of 2019.

“With a complex and ever-changing industry, learning travel should be a career-long mindset. We support continual advancement, and we have options from bite-sized, micro-learning opportunities to certification and everything in between, to help our travel professionals do just that,” Petras said.