The Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management (FTH) brings a new chapter in the RS and BiH education given the numerous tourist and other resources that derive from it. The Faculty is the result of the vision of the owner of the University of Business Studies (UPS), Prof. Radovan Klincov,PhD, and his closest associates. The aim of the new form of higher education in the tourism and hotel management is to create a highly educated staff that will satisfy the needs of modern times and society in this important segment of the economy.
The Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management has grown from a study group of the Faculty of Applied Economics, founded in the year of 2006.
The mission of the Faculty stems from the observed changes in the global tourism market which has increased interest in contemporary reviews for untouched nature, healthy food, diversity of climate, relief, religious, and ethno-cultural content, and the need to combine different forms of tourism such as: sports and recreation, health, religion, and others. Since the Republic of Srpska and Bosnia and Herzegovina abound in these facilities, which are to be converted into high-quality tourism products, the mission of the Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management is oriented towards creating a new staff able to respond to these changing needs of modern tourists and to overcome existing disproportion between education of the staff and the needs of modern tourism personnel. The aim of the Faculty is to educate personnel needed by the society that will be immediately employed and well coordinated in existing conditions. Students of the Faculty will be trained in direct conjunction with the reality, assuming present conditions, so that their knowledge will be fully up to date, fresh and applicable, in order to overcome the discrepancy between the knowledge and skills. The required balance will be achieved by the students of the Faculty, who, from the very beginning of the study, will be closely linked with tourism developments in the region, and will be ready to recognize and discover the potential of tourism turning it into high-quality tourism products adaptable to the finest requirements of the modern tourists. Through applying the latest achievements of technological progress, the Faculty graduates will be able to recognize and promote our valuable and competitive tourist facilities. This will encourage a receptive tourism that presents a growing generator of the region development, which is confirmed by the following facts:
- The World Tourism Organization predicts that BiH by 2020, will reach 3rd place based on the interests of tourists regarding tourists places and contents (now holds 39th place out of 125 ranked countries);
- In 2010, BiH has entered into 10 feature-rich destinations for religious pilgrimage tourism;
- In 2011, BiH has entered into 10 most desirable destinations for adventure, especially: wild water sports and mountain biking.
The Faculty slogan is “Return to nature and man”, because the rural tourism and hospitality are two key demands in the global world of tourism, and these are our main competitive advantages on which we can build a sustainable development for a longer period, and promote tourism as the generator of economic development of the RS and BiH. The mission of the Faculty will be feasible in a prolific cooperation with other actors of tourism policy: University of Business Studies, Faculty of Ecology, City Administration, National Tourist Organization, development agencies, and associations from the region, so that our tourism resources and personnel become a part of regional associations, which will operate in a prolific collaboration with the same goal: to make it better in the time when tourism is becoming increasingly important segment in our region and the holder of the economic development of countries in transition.
The study program of the Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management is designed in the tradition of the leading universities in the region, with all the standards that allow the inclusion of students in regional and European repository of art and knowledge, thus enabling students to create a tourism policy and use their theoretical and methodological knowledge to focus behavior of all tourism stakeholders in the desired direction: allow tourism to become a generator of sustainable development for a long time. This is the orientation that fully corresponds to our country, which abounds in nature’s gifts, and has no economic opportunities in the harsh global markets to offer a different option. Since rural tourism, which is at the top of tourist interest, is the branch that requires the least investment, it certainly is our chance for development. We have to build country’s potential, non-contamination, originality and variety into a quality tourism product and combine with our hospitality, which is in our nature, and which will be fully recognized throughout the education of students.
The strategy of the University and the Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management are guaranteed by a very high quality scientific and creative potential of professors and assistants, whose work has already been praised by our customers and society. The high standard of education is based on a reformed education and programs that are characterized by: openness, integrity, flexibility and a positive methodological approach – with emphasis on the optimistic spirit, but also on the development of critical consciousness in students. Since students, not professors, are in the center of strategic programs, the responsibility of professors is much higher: professors are always available to students, they are responsible for students’ ability to engage in tourism flows of the 21st century and turning challenges from the environment into chances and opportunities for the development of the city, region and state. Since almost all graduates of the first generation of the study program of tourism are employed, the Faculty has kept close contact with them. They are informed about all events at the University of Business Studies, invited to the joint meetings, conferences, congresses, lectures by eminent professors from the region, and the University is committed to their promotion and recruitment by conducting student internship, volunteer work, making recommendations and so forth.
