Bird, Geoff

Dr. Geoffrey Bird is an associate professor and the director of the School of Tourism and Hospitality. His research interests include heritage tourism, remembrance tourism, community development, poverty alleviation and sustainable tourism. Bird has over 25 years working in tourism, primarily in education and training development and delivery, serving in government, the non-profit and for-profit sectors. Bird has worked on three Canadian International Development Agency-funded tourism training projects in Vietnam and Malaysia. His research in war heritage involves partners such as Parks Canada, the BC Heritage Branch, Valour Canada and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Prior to Royal Roads, Bird spent seven years with the Ministry of Advanced Education managing policy and planning for public post-secondary tourism and hospitality education. He led the international implementation of the SuperHost Programs at Tourism BC and has also operated his own heritage tour company. He also served as convenor of the Tourism Management Diploma and Degree Programs at Capilano College for six years. Bird has also been involved with consulting opportunities in Southeast Asia, the Caribbean and across Canada. At the beginning of his career, he was a heritage guide at the Vimy Ridge National Memorial Site in France. Over the past few years, he has served twice as a visiting professor at Munich University of Applied Sciences and as a visiting scholar at Monash University, Melbourne. Bird has a PhD from the University of Brighton where he studied the relationship between tourism, remembrance and landscapes of war. He also holds an MSc in Training from the University of Leicester, U.K., where he studied tourism education policy and planning. His BA Honours degree in International Development is from the University of Guelph with a minor in French Literature. To access the documentary directed and produced by Geoffrey Bird, War Memories across Canada, visit the War Heritage Research Initiative website.