Highest Tertiary Tourism Education in the Island of Crete: Curriculum Reformation, Perspectives and Conflicts

The importance of studies in the tourism and hospitality sector is recognized globally. The provision of able labor force to confront the needs of the production, in consideration with the need of tertiary academic education, creates a conflict existence in curriculum change between the decision making groups. Nowadays, all the countries, especially the dependent ones of tourism, create tourism educational systems in order to confront the production’s increasing needs of capable personnel. This paper is concentrated in the provision of Tourism and Hospitality Education in the island of Crete, Greece. Through the primary research conducted with the tourism academics, it presents the conflicts between them and the actual reasons that enlarge it, the perceptions of the present curriculum (during the period the research was conducted), and the necessity of the future curriculum orientation and reformation.