About Us
National Capital Educational Tourism Project
The National Capital Educational Tourism Project (NCETP) is a collaborative marketing project, with the aim of encouraging schools throughout Australia to see the educational benefits of visit to Canberra.
The NCETP deliver a range of marketing and teacher professional development activities that showcase the pivotal role Canberra’s National Cultural Institutions (NCIs) have in exposing Students to the key elements of Australian democracy, history and heritage, science and art – and how, through their education programs – they can assist Teachers to deliver Australian Curriculum outcomes.
These strategies include:
- The annual production of the National Capital School Excursion Planner and other marketing collateral promoting the National Capital and its attractions.
- Mailouts to schools, containing NCETP and educational tourism industry marketing collateral.
- Attendance at Teacher conferences to promote directly to Teachers.
- The development of Teacher seminars and familiarisation tours to provide opportunities for NCIs to promote directly to Teachers.
- Providing an information service for schools planning excursions to the National Capital.
- Management of this website.
- Management of the Book Canberra Excursions website.
The NCETP operates under a Joint Venture Agreement between the National Capital Attractions Association (NCAA) – representing over 30 National Capital Attractions and tourism related businesses – and the ACT Government.
NCETP activities are supported by Canberra's NCIs.
The NCETP is delivered by a small team, with the support of an NCAA Executive Committee and the NCETP Stakeholder Council.
The NCETP commissions research into the Size and Effect of School Excursions to the National Capital every 2 years where possible.
This research was important to the creation of the NCETP, and it continues to provide valuable feedback on the educational tourism sector and NCETP initiatives.
The NCETP was instrumental in the development of the Parliament and Civics Education Rebate (PACER) program that assists over 100,000 Students with financial support to visit Canberra, and managed PACER in the period 2006–2013.
The NCETP engages with the Australian Capital Territory and Australian governments to promote schools visitation and the work of the NCIs, and advocates for the development of PACER to support more schools to visit Canberra.
The NCETP has won 6 Canberra Region Tourism Awards and 2 Australian Tourism Awards for Tourism Product Marketing.