What do Conrad International Centennial, Holiday inn Park View, Hyatt Regency, Inter-Continental, Mandarin Singapore, Marina Mandarin, Omni Marco Polo, Oriental, Pan Pacific, Raffles, Regent, Ritz-Carlton, Royal Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza, Shangri-La, and Sheraton Towers, have in common?  Well,  apart from being some of the leading hotels in Singapore, they are all NTU’s Practicum Partner Hotels.  In all, 25 hotels island-wide, including the above,  have lent their enthusiastic support to NTU, enabling the Office of Professional Attachments to write a new chapter in its Professional Attachment efforts.
 

What is Practicum?

Practicum is the label we gave the all-new 8-months long practical training with the industry that the B.Bus (Hospitality & Tourism Managment (HTM)) specialisation students have to undergo, as part of their academic programme.  The pioneer batch of the HTM students are about to join the industry for this training.

The Practicum training commences this year on May 12, 1997, one week after the Semester 2 exams are over, and will last till Jan 4, 1998. As this period overlaps the normal Semester 1 from July to November, a special academic session is designed for the HTM students during this period.  They will be working in the industry five days a week, and come to the School on Mondays only for their classes, with one day off each week.  Since they will be attending classes only once a week, the HTM semester is stretched from May 19 to November 2 so that, by the end of Semester 1, they too would have spent almost as many hours in the class room as the students from other specialisations.  During this period, the HTM students will study three full courses and work on their Applied Research Project, in addition to working in the industry for their Practicum training.
 

Industry Partnership

The hotel industry has welcomed this new initiative from NTU enthusiastically, making the term Practicum Partner Hotels not a mere label, but symbolising a true partnership with us.  The Partner Hotels have agreed to pay a minimum of $750 p.m. to the HTM students during their Practicum training, and give them a 15-day break (Oct 20 - Nov 2) to attend the examinations.  In addition, the students will also get a maximum of 10 days leave during this period.  Apart from duty meals, uniforms, etc., the trainees will also be entitled to other benefits and allowances which vary from hotel to hotel.  The number of trainees ranges from just one to as many as 20, across the different Partner Hotels.  The response from the industry has been so good that as many as 97 positions have been offered by the 25 Partner Hotels against only 67 students in this batch.

The Practicum Training

During the Practicum training, the HTM students will specialise either in the Rooms Division or the F&B Division.  The former encompasses the Front Desk, Reservations, Guest Relations, Concierge’s Desk, and Housekeeping, to name some of the areas of work.  The latter covers the various Restaurants, Kitchens, Kitchen Stewarding, Banquets, and Catering.  Depending upon whichever area the students choose to specialise in, they will spend five months in their primary specialisation area and one-and-a-half months in the alternate area.  This is to ensure that all the students are exposed to both these major operations areas in any hotel, by the end of their training.  In addition, all the students will also spend one month in the non-operations areas, such as Sales & Marketing, Finance & Accounting, and Human Resources.

The way the Practicum training is positioned with the industry is that many of the students can look forward to going back to the same hotels with which they now train, on permanent employment after they complete their last semester in NTU in April 1998.  Several hotels are integrating this Practicum training with their medium term entry level management recruitment.  One hotel is even planning to place such permanently employed graduates, who would have trained with it now, on its fast track management development programme.  Some of the leading chain hotels are also viewing the Practicum training programme, and the subsequent permanent absorption of our graduates into their entry level management positions, as a way to create a potential management pool that can be groomed and deployed across the region as these chains continue to expand all over the region.  While we certainly do not want to count our chickens before they hatch, there is every likelihood that we will see several of our HTM graduates in top management positions in the hotel industry across the region within the next two decades.

At the time of going to press with this issue of ATTACHPAL, the Practicum recruitment is in full swing.  The Partner Hotels have sent their recruitment notices to be displayed on Campus (see picture), the students have sent their applications in response, and the interviews are already in progress.  The recruitment phase is expected to be completed by end-March.
 

The Future

While the first Practicum programme has concentrated on the hotel industry, being the largest employer of professional managers in this field, plans are already afoot to extend this programme next year to the other sectors of the Hospitality and Tourism Industry, i.e., the Restaurant Industry, Travel Industry, Visitor Attractions, and so on.  In fact, one unsolicited inquiry has already been received from a restaurant, which is part of a leading international chain, showing interest in our Practicum programme.  More exciting times are surely ahead for the coming batches of our BBus (HTM) students.  As the excerpts from correspondence from the Practicum Partner Hotels show (see inset), for the students committed to a career in this field, the industry is certainly eagerly awaiting.
 
 

For further information on the HTM Practicum programme, please contact Dr. Bvsan Murthy, HTM Practicum Coordinator, who has also contributed this cover story, c/o Office of Professional Attachments, Level 4, Admin Annex, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798.
 
 

"Having met some of the students from the Bachelor of Business (Hospitality and Tourism) programme during their field visit on 23 September 1996, I am pleased to confirm that The Pan Pacific Hotel Singapore will be able to accept twenty students for professional attachment starting May next year for 8 months."

Ms. Wong Hong Pinn, Training Manager
The Pan Pacific Hotel Singapore
 
 

"Thank you for forwarding the applications for practicum trainees.  We are impressed with the quality of your students and indeed had quite a difficult time shortlisting them."

Ms. Leong Yoke Mui, Training Manager
Mandarin Singapore