eLearning Courses for Tourism and Heritage duringa Pandemic: The Case of ‘Tourism Managementat UNESCO World Heritage Sites (Vol. 3)’

The tourism industry relies heavily on new technological advancements; through them, hospitality and service businesses can perform their operations, influence and predict future trends and visitors’ demands, and create new experiences. Due toits characteristics – high staff turnover, seasonality, a delicate equilibrium of micro,small and medium enterprises as well as global business conglomerates – the tourism sector must adapt at the same pace of innovations in digital technologies in order to survive. Education and training have been adopting digital media and Informationand Communication Technologies (ICTS) extensively in instances where traditionalface-to-facelessonsarenotpossible orsustainable.Wherelearningactivitieshappenonline thanks to digital means, we speak of ‘eLearning,’ which has shown to be beneficial in terms of cutting costs, offering time and space flexibility and, in the case of the tourism industry, in keeping tourism operators continuously updated, up skilled and engaged with industry and consumer trends. With the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020, the usefulness and flexibility of digital technologies for education and training have become even more apparent. Remote work or telecommuting have become anintegral part of people’s lives and workplaces. In many instances, eLearning provedto be the key element for an industry’s survival – and in some cases success. In this paper, the case of a particular type of eLearning phenomenon will be analysed: that of so-called Massive Open Online Courses, or ‘MOOCS.’ The example of the third volume of a MOOC series dedicated to tourism and heritage, ‘Tourism ManagementatWorldHeritageSites (Vol.3),’will be used to outline the characteristic sof its learners, as well as to show the significance and relevance of eLearning for the tourism and heritage sector.