The tourism industry is in a state of upheaval. Issues such as climate change, digitalization, the coronavirus pandemic and changing work and business models are presenting the industry with challenges. In addition to travel behavior and the demands of customers (fast, spontaneous, conscious, secure, ecological), the demands on professionals in the leisure and tourism industry have also changed. They must be able to recognize social, economic, ecological, technological and political contexts and develop innovative and sustainable travel offers accordingly. The HF Tourism Specialist course provides the necessary specialist knowledge and skills for this.
The HF tourism specialist course has been in existence since 1991 and is well established in the industry and well known among employees. - The qualification as a Tourism Specialist HF is currently the most important of three qualifications in higher vocational education and training in the field of tourism; the other two qualifications, the professional examinations "Tourism Guest Services Specialist with Federal Certificate" and "Travel Specialist with Federal Certificate", will probably not be offered for much longer due to a lack of demand (the Swiss Tourism Association has decided not to continue sponsoring the professional examination). Two other qualifications, the professional examinations "Tourism assistant with a federal certificate" and the higher professional examination "Federally certified tourism expert" were abolished in 2018 and 2019 respectively.
Higher technical college (HF) courses are generally designed to be practice-oriented and impart specialist knowledge as well as technical and management skills in the respective field. HF graduates are in high demand on the job market.