One of the main threats warns of the lack of valuation of heritage that, sometimes, is seen as a merchandise instead of as an educational resource, capable of raising awareness and transmitting values such as respect, empathy or plurality cultural. Faced with such threats, heritage education is established as a key tool to promote a conciliatory process between tourism and heritage, projecting the image of tourism as an activity that cannot be understood without a pedagogical structure. Its main purpose is to sensitize visitors and the host community about the importance of preserving heritage. To do this, it uses heritage interpretation as an environmental educational strategy. This generates activities aimed at generating a feeling of appreciation and respect through direct contact with the patrimonial referents. Thus, tourist experiences appear as an ideal place for the development of the principles of heritage education, given that they facilitate a real approach of people with heritage. In this way, well-managed tourism practices can provide a large number of pedagogical advantages: awareness of conservation, recovery of local culture, revitalization of monuments, enhancement of the feeling of identity, respect for cultural diversity and recognition of territories and its resources. Considering the harmful impacts that, in many cases, characterize tourism practices and, at the same time, their educational possibilities, this study arises. Its main purpose is to know and analyze the extent to which heritage education is disseminated in the territories of the Monfragüe National Park, the Villuercas-Ibores-Jara Geopark and Trujillo. Several research questions have been considered for this. a) What are the main advantages and possible impacts of tourism activity ?; b) What are the causes of impacts and solutions ?; c) Is heritage education spreaded ?; d) What is the role of interpretation centers and what is the profesional training of their staff ?; e) Are educational activities aimed at tourists developed? Thereby, it is intended to know if the tourist activities are developed taking into account that pedagogical component that, necessarily, they must possess. The targeted areas have been selected for two fundamental reasons. The first one is due to the great wealth of heritage manifestations, natural and cultural, that they possess, which is an exceptional landscape and cultural beauty. The second one is due to their tourist interest, capable of attracting thousands of travelers every year (Table 0).
Tabla 0. Traveller distribution
|
Territory |
Travellers |
Overnights |
Average stay |
|
Monfragüe National Park |
77.593 |
148.925 |
1,92 |
|
Villuercas-Ibores-Jara Geopark |
34.891 |
56.744 |
1,63 |
|
Trujillo |
96.522 |
164.414 |
1,70 |
These three areas have a great national and even international prestige, through their recognition by UNESCO and the existence of numerous Goods of Cultural Interest. All these reasons justify their tourist interest and, at the same time, their educational possibilities. Likewise, the proximity between these three zones defines an ideal territory for conducting scientific studies. According to its approach, the research was developed from a qualitative methodological research perspective, through semi-structured interviews. Its purpose is to analyze the voices of the participants, in order to perform a detailed analysis of each of their interventions and respond to the main objectives of the study. For this, 25 experts have participated, whose professional positions are developed in the targeted territories and are part of the educational or tourim sector, configuring the panel of experts. For the selection of this panel, those that could offer a representative speech of the places were considered, taking into account their professional training and experience.
In order to collect data, an in-depth interview was used, based on open questions. From the experts' responses, a system of categories-subcategories was gradually formed. More specifically, it was based on the transcripts of the interviews, from which the most significant segments were recovered, assigning labels and grouping the data into analyzable units. Through this process the different categories were generated, which were defined based on some common property or element. From the initial categories, several subcategories were used to segment and analyze the information, concerns or ideas of the interviewees. This caused to look for several fragments in the text as evidences. Based on these subcategories, comparisons and similarities were established with the points of view expressed by the rest of the experts, until theoretical saturation was achieved and finally, the resulting categories-subcategories scheme was configured. Among the results, the following stand out:
- The advantages of tourism are fundamentally associated with economic income while sociocultural issues remain in the background. The increase in education as one of the advantages of tourism activity is not mentioned on any occasion. - The main impacts derived from tourism are the existence of irresponsible human behaviors, periods of overcrowding and a loss of identity. The causes of these problems are the lack of education, followed by a dearth of coordination and planning, the shortage of training requirements of the guides, the need to conduct studies to assess the risks of an activity, an offer that is too widespread and the ignorance of the tourist about the value of resources. - Among the solutions, education appears as the main tool to relieve the problems caused, betting on training aimed at guides and tourists. Other solutions are: increasing levels of control and surveillance, paying a tourist fee, designing a more centralized offer, conducting research, improving dissemination and generating meeting points with entrepreneurs. - One of the main findings shows a lack of heritage education, especially justified by a lack of didactic training in guides, followed by deficiencies in education from school, scrcity of planning in the design of tourist practices and the assessment of tourism depending on the number of visitors, without considering educational issues. To improve this situation, the following action measures are proposed: consolidating the figure of the heritage educator, generating didactic activities, promoting continuing education, integrating environmental education, having a multidisciplinary team for space management and improving planning. - Unsatisfactory functioning of interpretation centers due to the lack of didactic training of the staff, the inadequate planning in their design, the insufficiente of cooperative work, their free nature and the paucity of renovation. - The didactic activities are carried out occasionally, are aimed primarily at children, do not have a didactic intentionality and for their realization depend on the teacher's own interest.
- Dissemination deficiencies, due to several reasons: the need for a figure in charge of preventive promotion, poor inter-territorial coordination, lack of planning, insufficient online promotion, abandonment of some resources and inadequate event management. After responding to the objectives, the registered solutions are an element of great utility, since they can be used as future strategies to improve tourism-educational experiences. In addition, this study has detected the needs and problems that tourism generates in specific heritage spaces. This enables the design of intervention guidelines that allow the improvement of the territories towards sustainability, at the same time that their competitiveness is assured as tourist destinations and their educational potential becomes visible. That is, the results provide valuable information for decision-making aimed at the proper management of tourism activity. This is one of the first studies that shows the suitability of tourism activities as essential spaces to develop teaching strategies. Even more relevant is if we consider that the selected areas are major focal points of tourist attraction within the autonomous, national and international territory. Classification-JEL: R1 Keywords: Educación Patrimonial, Experiencias Turísticas, Parque Nacional de Monfragüe, Geoparque Villuercas-Ibores-Jara, Trujillo., Heritage Education, Tourist Experiences, Monfragüe National Park, Villuercas-Ibores-Jara Geopark Pages: 49-83 Volume: 1 Year: 2022 File-URL: http://www.revistaestudiosregionales.com/documentos/articulos/pdf-articulo-2625.pdf File-Format: Application/pdf Handle: RePEc:rer:articu:v:1:y:2022:p:49-83