Search Results (7)

We analyze the recent media reports related to food and agriculture education (FAE) in Taiwan and present the main aspects of the FAE in different ways such as historical society and ethics, food and agriculture industry and responsibility, food and agriculture culture preservation, and education and health promotion. The reports are classified into seven categories: culture, life, agriculture, campus, society, environment, and industry. The results point out the enhancement of the sustained development of the FAE in the post-legislative era due to the increased consolidated relationships among the sustainable development goals (SDGs) and FAE in the food (production and marketing certification), agriculture (commercializing organic agriculture certification), and travel (friendly conservation tourism). Further research needs to focus on the main evaluated aspects of FAE that appear more frequently in the related research for the promotion of education and health, and historical and ethical justice. FAE seems to be preferred in the metropolitan area while teaching in the cultural field is more important in the non-metropolitan area than in the metropolitan area, which needs further study. Full article

This study is conducted to investigate the effectiveness and readiness of teaching and learning among students during the pandemic (COVID-19) towards the online learning among hospitality and tourism students. A quantitative method was employed and students from the Faculty of Hotel and Tourism Management Penang Campus were chosen as the target sample. The sample size for this study was 430 and a total of 360 questionnaires were successfully collected with the return rate of 83.72%. Descriptive analysis was used to interpret the demographic data, Pearson Correlation analysis was employed to examine the correlation among variables, and multiple regression analysis was used to measure the overall relationship between independent and dependent variables. From these analyses, the three (3) variables (social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence) were found to have positive relationships with a student’s learning experience. Overall, this study is important to fellow academicians, academic researchers, and practitioners in improving their methods of teaching and learning, assisting the students, and strengthening their teaching techniques in online learning. Full article

Smart campus microgrids are considered in this paper, with the aim of highlighting their applicability in the framework of the sustainable energy transition. In particular, the campus of the Hellenic Mediterranean University (HMU) in Heraklion, Crete, Greece, is selected as a case study to highlight the multiple campus microgrids’ advantages. Crete represents an interesting insular power system case, due to the high renewable energy sources capacity and the large summer tourism industry. There is also a high density of university and research campuses, making the campus microgrid concept a promising solution for the energy transition and decarbonization of the island. In this sense, policy directions that could facilitate the development of the smart campus microgrid are also given, to motivate areas with similar characteristics. For the performed case study, the HMU microgrid is assumed to consist of PV systems, wind turbines, battery energy storage systems and EV chargers. The analysis explores the financial feasibility and environmental impact of such an investment through the optimal sizing of the systems under investigation, while a sensitivity analysis regarding the battery system cost is also performed. Apart from the financial benefits of the investment, it is evident that the main grid experiences a significant load reduction, with the microgrid acting as a RES producer for many hours, hence improving system adequacy. Moreover, it is shown that the location of HMU makes the investment more sustainable compared to other locations in northern Europe, such as Stockholm and London. The methodology and the derived results are expected to motivate such investments, especially in areas with high RES capacity and a high density of university and research campuses. Full article

University campus tourism is an important component and extension of urban tourism. The campus landscapes at universities act as major reflections of the interaction between regional natural and humanistic environments and initiate a strong visual perception or sensory feelings of the campus, which play a positive guiding role in campus tourism resource development. In order to better understand the role of landscapes in campus tourism, the Wangjiang Campus of Sichuan University was selected as the study area. Campus landscapes under the comprehensive influence of natural and humanistic environments were studied based on three different multi-level (scale) perspectives including: (i) point scale, (ii) line scale and (iii) plane scale, as well as different research themes comprising: (i) landscapes of buildings and vegetation, (ii) color landscapes, (iii) landscapes of campus space utilization, and (iv) thermal landscapes. The results show that the Wangjiang Campus landscapes have strong environmental natural landscape components linked with strong humanistic landscapes, which may provide lively, positive and relaxed visual feelings to tourists in the form of affirmative landscape services. The formation and development of the campus landscapes are affected by the geographic environments and campus culture, and it is conducive to the formation of unique campus genius loci. Nowadays, the landscapes of Wangjiang Campus have become a distinctive visiting card of campus tourism. This study would be helpful in better understating of the campus landscapes using new perspectives, as well as could be used as references for the development of university-campus-tourism. Full article

Starting from an experimental activity, the paper describes research analysis that has been conducted on a real case construction with the aim to design its adaptation as a nearly zero energy building in three possible alternative scenarios: (i) a lab for students’ activities in the Lecco University Campus of Politecnico di Milano; (ii) an Alpine shelter for the implementation of a sustainable mountain tourism in Zermatt; (iii) an emergency shelter for poor communities in Burkina Faso. The use of an easily disassembled and lightweight steel structure coupled with dry-layered technologies allows a tailor-made envelope design, ensuring high thermal comfort, very low energy use, and limited construction times. The three case studies have been designed starting from the same architectural/structural concept. A detailed analysis, by means of finite element method and dynamic building thermal simulations, has been performed to predict the overall performances of each case study. The results show: (i) high replicability of the concept; (ii) high customization of the envelope technologies; (iii) high energy efficiency; and (iv) high thermal comfort of the architecture. The useful energy requirement in all the three analyzed scenarios is minimized and equal to 14.13, 23.88, and 41.83 kWh/m² year, respectively, for the students’ lab, the Alpine shelter and the emergency shelter. According to this study the energy needs can be covered by renewable energy produced on site, making the architectural concept an interesting modular lightweight solution for a nearly zero energy building with high potential for replicability. Full article

Sustainability challenges in tourism are widely discussed. There is a huge need for education in the field of destination development. Students require appropriate problem-solving skills. This article examines the master’s course in destination development at Uppsala University, Campus Gotland, with the aim of increasing students’ skills in solving sustainability problems. The course took place in the spring semester of 2020 with the main goal of improving students’ skills in formulating and solving sustainable challenges in groups. This was achieved by activating the heterogeneity of the group, seeking relevant information and facts, and organising and carrying out the task with a design-thinking methodology. Students were provided with real problems or challenges by tourist companies, authorities and other interest groups on the island of Gotland. The purpose of this study is to describe the group of students as well as joint learning processes and knowledge needed in the work towards sustainable solutions. The major implication of the study is that the course gave the students the opportunity to deepen their understanding of both the barriers and benefits of working with heterogeneous groups. Furthermore, the study revealed a number of factors that all organisations would need to take into account in order to improve the effectiveness of their work towards sustainable solutions. Full article

This paper explores a blend of digital and traditional methods to inform about a city’s popular spaces. Using locational data from social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, along with using participatory field surveys and direct observations and combining insights from architecture and urban design literature, this study reveals popular socio-spatial clusters in the city of Chicago. The locational data of photographs were visualized by using geographic information systems, and they helped in producing heat maps that showed the spatial distribution of posted photographs. The geo-intensity of photographs illustrated the areas that are the most visited in the city. The study’s results indicate that the city’s most popular places include Millennium Park, Maggie Daley Park, Navy Pier, the Magnificent Mile Gateway, the Inner Loop, the Water Tower Area, the River Confluence, Museum Campus, Urban Giants, Grant Park, and the River City complex. The findings elucidate that social media plays an important role in promoting places and thereby sustaining a greater interest and stream of visitors. Consequently, planners should tap into the public’s digital engagement in city places to improve tourism and the economy. Full article