37 new tour guides certified |17 December 2019
The tour guides in a souvenir photograph with guests (Photo: Anel Robert)
Another batch of 37 new tour guides got their license yesterday after completing a five-day basic tour guide course at the Seychelles Tourism Academy (STA) in collaboration with the department of tourism.
Now the newly certified tour guides can apply for a tour guide license, if they wish to take up this as a career.
This is the last training offered by the department of tourism and as from next year the training will be offered by STA as part of its in-service package.
“Every time we offered this training, it was on five-day schedule. But we received some complaints noting that the five days were not enough to prepare the tour guides. You are the ambassadors for giving Seychelles a good name and we count on you. We have more and more people who are joining this course without any background in the field and we feel that in order to market Seychelles with the tourists they need to know Seychelles well and every corner that adds value to it. STA will now take on the delivery of this course and it will be offered twice a year as from next year,” noted the principal secretary for tourism, Anne Lafortune.
On behalf of the participants, Juanne Bamboche thanked the three instructors – Merna Lajoie, Kelly Agathine and Katherine Didon – and said that “we have learnt a lot during the past three days and we have learnt how to practice this job more professionally. Our industry depends a lot on tourists and we need to always protect the interests of our clients and to always understand their needs. We have to treat our clients with respect and be honest as this will give a good name to Seychelles”.
Talking to our newspaper, Kelly Wirtz, 24 years old, shared that she is currently employed but she wanted to do this course to get more skills and maybe to earn some extra money.
Tatiana Servina does not have any experience in tour guiding and decided to do this course just in case there is any opening in this field.
The course took place at the STA at La Misère from December 10 to 16, 2019.
Vidya Gappy