It’s officially Saturday, and I’ve had my coffee and a breakfast of Belgium waffles, I’ve completed my Duolingo French lessons for the day, and now I’m ready to work on my Central European Specialist courses! I thought I’d make a little blog post first about what this course actually means.
First of all, there is a company that is dedicated to travel advisor education. That’s literally all they do! The company is called The Travel Institute, and besides destination specialist programs, they also offer one of the best general travel advisor certifications in the industry, the CTA (Certified Travel Associate). This course covers literally all the things a travel advisor needs to know to be good at what they do, including professional skills (some of these courses are Business Ethics, Customer-Focused Selling, Time Management, Customer Needs, etc) and practical skills (some of these courses include Accepting and Processing Payments, Planning Itineraries, Travel Insurance, etc). This course is not cheap, with a price tag of either $599 for the online version or $1299 for the print version, and there is also a prerequisite to enroll of either a minimum of one year of industry experience or passing a test called the Travel Agent Proficiency (TAP) exam with a score of 80% or higher (side note, just for fun: most new agents who choose to take the TAP exam enroll in a program called TRIPKIT first. The TRIPKIT program is $499, and includes the TAP test, or you can forgo the TRIPKIT and take the TAP test for $95). So, it is quite a large time and financial investment for a new agent, but from what I have heard, the information one gains from these certifications is incredibly valuable, and offers one of the best starts to one’s travel planning career! I am currently trying to decide if I should wait until I have one year of industry experience and enroll in the CTA program in the fall, or if I should go ahead and enroll in the TRIPKIT program now. I will definitely let you know what I decide to do!
In the meantime, besides offering those amazing programs for every travel advisor, they also offer smaller, more specialized programs one can enroll in to increase their knowledge and expertise in their chosen “niche”! Should I make a post about what a niche is and what my thoughts are on selecting my own niche? Let me know if you’re interested in that! Anyway, this is where I’m beginning my education through The Travel Institute! Each of their specialist courses are around $89, and is a deep-dive into one specific area or type of travel. The Travel Institute offered a really awesome Black Friday special in 2025, and I was able to enroll in their Paris Specialist course for free!!! November and December, and even January, were so busy, I didn’t have a chance to get started, but when I did finally login in and start reading through what all the Paris Specialist course entailed, I realized I would be better off purchasing and enrolling in the Central European Specialist course and completing it first, and then diving into the Paris Specialist course next! It was such a great decision, as I am working through the Central EU course and learning so much, including a lot of information about Paris in the chapter for France!
The Central European Specialist focuses on 9 European countries: Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg (fun fact: those 3 countries together are called the Beneluxe countries, a name given when they formed an economic union in 1948!), France, Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and Austria. So far, I’ve worked through the chapters on Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg, and France, which has taken more than 2 weeks due to my very careful note-taking and getting distracted checking out the really cool cities and sites I am reading about on my VR headset (if you have a VR headset, you MUST subscribe to the Wooorld app, which is basically Google Earth! It is the coolest thing I’ve ever experienced with my VR headset, and I am so excited to check out my dad’s 360 camera this summer and see if I feel like I can figure it out enough to buy my own and create 360 content during my own travels!). This weekend I am hoping to dedicate as much time as I need to finish up the other four countries (I’ve got a list of cool places to check out on my VR headset AFTER I’ve finished! LOL!), but we’ll see how it goes! I already prepared the notes, which was the biggest time investment, so now I just have to actually read and absorb all of that information. Wish me luck!
Once I’ve finished all of the courses for the Central European Specialist (each course includes a section exam), I will register for the Central European Specialist exam! This exam is a 2-hour proctored test, and it is closed-notes, which means that I will have a LOT of studying to do before I feel ready to schedule the test. Once I ace that exam, I’ll be ready to move on to Paris! The Paris course is a little bit different, and requires the course completion, a 1-hour proctored exam, and then the extra step of 5 items on the “Experiential Checklist” or a “Destination Visit Report”. We will talk more about what that entails when I’ve started my Paris course, but it’s pretty intense work!
I am considering signing up for The Travel Institute’s “Education Hub” service, which is an annual subscription that would grant access to all of their destination and niche courses, plus a $20 discount on each of their required tests. I think this is probably going to be the best deal for me, since once I’ve obtained my certification for Central Europe and Paris, I am excited to enroll in more of their courses, including: Northern Europe, Southern Europe, The Netherlands, and Italy, as well as some of their Niche Market courses, including Group Travel, Luxury Travel, and maybe Honeymoons/Destination Weddings and Wellness Travel!
Basically, when I say that 2026 is going to be a year full of education for me, I really mean it! There is so much knowledge to be gained from The Travel Institute, and this is just ONE of the sites I am utilizing this year to truly become an expert in European travel planning!!! But for now, it’s time to get to work learning all there is to know about traveling to Germany. Bonne journée! À bientôt!
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