Spearheading Sustainability in the Travel Industry
Date
2020-04-24
Advisors
Klein, Emily
von Windheim, Jesko
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Abstract
Our client, Duke Alumni Travels, offers Duke alumni, family, and friends with enriching
educational and cultural travel programs across the globe. In line with Duke University’s
goal to become carbon neutral by 2024, Duke Alumni Travels is leading a sustainability
movement by transforming how the educational travel industry approaches and measures
its environmental impact. In the interest of its educational mission and institutional
commitments to sustainability, our client is eager to inform travelers about its tour
operators’ sustainability practices both at destinations and within their own operations.
This Master’s Project (MP) Team was formed to 1) assess and report on the sustainability
practices of Duke Alumni Travels’ tour operators and, 2) to provide recommendations
on how to communicate these practices to Duke Alumni Travels’ travelers. With a focus
on Environmental, Economic, and Socio-Cultural sustainability, the MP Team developed
a framework to benchmark each of the operators’ sustainability practices. Our research
has been complemented by opportunities to raise awareness around the need for improved
travel practices. Over the year, the MP team has brought sustainability to the forefront
of the educational travel industry by: hosting a Sustainable Travel Panel with industry
leaders at NSOE (Oct. ‘19), and leading a Keynote Presentation about the project at
the annual Educational Travel Consortium Conference (Feb. ‘20). The team’s findings
will help the operators address their greatest environmental impact areas, as well
as give way to future Master’s Projects.
Type
Master's projectPermalink
https://hdl.handle.net/10161/20513Citation
Mercer, Annabelle; McCorstin, Courtney; & Burch, Samantha (2020). Spearheading Sustainability in the Travel Industry. Master's project, Duke University. Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/20513.Collections
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