| During the WAST training that took place in Torino in early September 2023, all the programme participants and partners had the opportunity to test the online platform created for the purposes of WAST by logging in, getting familiarised, browsing through, uploading content, connecting, and spotting any discrepancies. Pre-launch, Cyberno designed the macrostructure of the online space with the support of all the partners. The view was to create a user- friendly platform and available both for people interested or professionals in alternative and sustainable tourism and artists alike. The Online Community includes all the project results while it is directly linked to the official website of the project. All the project results follow the open educational resources philosophy (OER) and are available in various media and in all partner languages, namely English, Greek, Italian, Polish and Ukrainian. More specifically, the online platform is constructed as follows: Module 1 acts as the central hub containing features of recent posts, popular threads, and links to the various subcategories and encourages user participation. Module 2 is about the Community Pages. In this section, young professionals can create new networks of collaboration between the partner countries with other organisations, individuals etc in sustainable and alternative tourism to promote their work. Professionals are able to give information and tips for the different countries of the project (e.g. thematic tours, eco-tourism, food stations, nightlife stations etc.). Also, they have the opportunity to create profiles with personal descriptions in order to promote their work alongside images, videos etc. and interact with each other. Module 3 contains the Community Space threads arranged in a clear and readable manner to allow users to scan the thread and easily follow particular discussions, comments, questions and answers. The goal is to have an improved User Experience (UX) with a “like” feature, enabling linking to individual replies, and allow users to sort by popularity and recency. Beneficiaries are able to visit the online space as guest users, to share their experiences, find tourism-related opportunities and contact the relevant professionals for further information. In this way, youth employment is promoted and so is sustainable and alternative tourism and cultural heritage in each participating country. |
