From classroom knowledge to community-based practice: a mixed-methods inquiry into tourism experience management competencies in northern mountainous Vietnam

Abstract

Community-based tourism requires professionals to translate contextual knowledge into competencies that can be enacted under complex destination conditions. This study examines tourism experience management competencies among undergraduate students in Northern Mountainous Vietnam using a mixed-methods design combining assessments from 270 final-year students with semi-structured interviews involving students, lecturers, destination managers, and tourism authorities. Five competency domains were examined. Results reveal an uneven profile: local cultural and social knowledge was comparatively strongest, whereas digital technology application and multi-stakeholder coordination were weaker. Qualitative findings indicate that students possessed stronger conceptual and procedural foundations than capabilities requiring adaptation, technological operation, and cross-organizational interaction. The study identifies this pattern as a knowledge–enactment gap and shows that its extent varies across competency domains. The findings suggest that effective competency development requires alignment between specific competencies and the experiential conditions through which they are enacted, highlighting the importance of competency-specific experiential learning and university–destination collaboration.