Filipinos are known to be hospitable as a people, a culture perfected through time since the Spanish occupancy of the country. Some say the reason why we cannot be at par with other nations is our being too, too hospitable. But, economists and entrepreneurs look at it from another point of view. It is our being inherently hospitable why Filipinos are found in most reception areas of hotels abroad.
Catching up with the booming ICT industry, hotels and restaurants are sprouting all over the world. Eve Montecillo, program head of Hotel and Restaurant Management (HRM) of the Philippine College of Technology (PCT), says that many hotels were under construction in Macau when she was on a field trip there with 17 of their students in March last year.
Even Hanah Joy Gaviola, HRM teacher and on-job-training (OJT) coordinator of the Philippine Women’s College (PWC), can attest to the fact that HRM graduates are “super in demand”, the reason why even international companies call them up to refer their alumni for employment.
Philippine Women’s College
Presently headed by Ms. Rachel Guinan, the HRM program of PWC has gone a long way in teaching students how to perfect the Filipino tradition of being hospitable in order to be useful in the economy. Being the first school to offer HRM in Mindanao, PWC started its HRM program in 1975, but as a two-year program, and later upgraded it to a four-year degree in 1980 which became tri-mestral since 2006.
For 20 years, HRM has been the school’s flagship and has sent OJTs to hotels and restaurants not only in the city but in other parts of Mindanao and even to Singapore for the past 10 years.
Gaviola said she deployed 261 students for OJT only this summer (April-May) to Cebu, Manila and abroad. She added that with 20 schools offering HRM and culinary courses in the city, there are not enough establishments here to accommodate all of them.
The 57th graduation exercise was held last March for 98 graduates of the HRM program of the PWC. They had 800 students in this course in the current school year. The school is projecting more enrollees of HRM students in June. Julie Ann Legaspi, an alumnus and teacher of HRM, said the school’s faculty is one of the plus factors of PWC in this program. “We have a multi-skills faculty, teaching both minor and major subjects,” she said. Legaspi has been tracing the whereabouts of their alumni with HRM degrees.
“We also excel in competitions, in the national and local levels,” Gaviola said. Their team was the first grand champion of the Mindanao Culinary Festival in 1995-1996. In 1996, they won the bartending and waiters relay categories, competitions sponsored by the Hotel and Restaurant Association of the Philippines (HRAP).
Philippine College of Technology
When the PCT was established in 1993 it had already offered HRM programs. After 16 years, it was only in 2008 that the number of HRM students increased by 70%. In 2009-2010, PCT had 160 graduates.
Students had their OJT mostly aboard in Superferry vessels under their apprenticeship by experience program. “This program is advantageous to our students because it’s more on hands-on,“ Montecillo said. They also have linkages with The Marco Polo Davao and Grand Regal Hotel in Davao for OJT.
Based on the ladderized scheme and competency-based curriculum, every end of the semester, HRM students of PCT undergo OJT for a total of 1,385 hours in four years. Every year level has respective areas; OJT focuses food and beverages services in the first year, bar services and housekeeping in the second year, baking and front office in the third year, and managerial skills in the fourth.
In addition, PCT has international hotel exposure programs like last March when 17 students went to Macau for one week. PCT is targeting to link with hotels in Singapore for students’ OJT and field trips. They have field trips every year at local and international hotels (particularly in Macau).
“PCT does not only produce HRM graduates but also provide them with employment. Through its tracer study, they learned that most of their alumni are working in hotels in Holland and Macau, and on cruise lines like on Superferries and in its international cruise line – Jibsin, and some on Norwegian cruises,” Montecillo said.
There’s more than 100% increase in studentry in HRM from 300 in 2008 to 670 in 2009. PCT projects another 100% in 2010 enrolment. PCT also offers short term courses for 345 hours based on TESDA standards like bartending and food and beverages services.
“In Macau, we saw a lot of hotels being constructed which means employment will be waiting for Filipinos there. I can really say that Macau is the Las Vegas in Asia and most of the hotels and restaurant crews there are Filipinos,” Montecillo said.
University of The Immaculate Conception
For the past four years, the University of the Immaculate Conception (UIC) had offered the HRM course together with the Nutrition and Dietetics (ND) course (25 years already), as one program.
“The two courses were merged since both courses concern food,” said UIC ND/HRM Dean Sister Ma. Consilio Bernadette Laus, RVM in an interview. She added that only UIC has a separate laboratory intended for ND/HRM students.
The ND/HRM laboratory, also dubbed “hotel” is a three-storey, fully furnished building with state-of-the-art facilities. It is WIFI (wireless internet) ready and more than that, in its ground level may be found the front desk, bar, kitchen and office; function hall and another kitchen on the second floor; and rooms on the third level.
OJT of some students, which is done on their last semester in college in the United States; while the majority do it at The Marco Polo Davao while two students are assigned at Pearl Farm.
Sister Laus said they weren’t able to publicize the HRM course before, that’s why only 14 students graduated last March, the first batch of HRM graduates of UIC. It is anticipated that up to 60 students will graduate from this course in the next academic year, according to said Sister Laus.
Another plus factor of the HRM course offered at the UIC is that it is ladderized. Students are not only taught inside the four walls of the room or inside the laboratory but are as well exposed to different contests like Table Setting,Table Skirting, Napkin Folding, Vegetable Carving, and Waiters Relay,” she added. UIC ensures that students are given their needs in their learning and training in choosing their field of profession. [Lorie A. Cascaro with Vicky Berdina M. de Guzman]
