CELEBRATING HOSPITALITY EDUCATORS

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HOSPITALITY EDUCATION & INDUSTRY :BRIDGING THE GAP: A Conversation with a Hospitality Educator

GH-Hospitality (GH-H) is dedicating the first quarter of the year to educators in ‘hospitality’ as indicated in her post of 11^th January, 2019; her way of acknowledging their efforts and celebrating them.

Teaching hospitality courses involves imparting knowledge, skills and attitudes simultaneously to learners. It is an art that takes practice and dedication to master. It takes patience, empathy and above all passion to care for each student/learner, to understand learners’ abilities and to uncover their hidden potentials.

In this post GH-H hosts Ms. Esther Aryee, a retired hospitality educator.

Ms Aryee’s exposures to the industry abroad were in three different establishments. These include a Hospital, a Staff Canteen, and a College Refectory( dining hall), all of which were in Edinburgh, Scotland.

After her study of Institutional Management (IM) she worked in the Sick Kids Hospital, beginning as a staff cook, then was promoted to Assistant Catering Officer.

   

She was later employed by Ferranti Ltd Edinburgh. She started there as a cook. Again she earned a promotion to Assistant Canteen Manageress. Her responsibilities included supervision of the kitchen, processing invoices and controlling the stores.

Her last position before leaving Edinburgh was with Napier College of Science and Technology where she started as an Assistant Refectory Manageress and later acted as the Manageress supervising 23 personnel.

GH-H: Thank you, Ms Aryee, for granting me this opportunity to have a one-on-one with you.  I know we are both in the same ‘boat’ of retirees, but like the message depicted on the cup (picture on the left), “We may be on retirement but we are always educators at heart.”

Do you think this phrase is an empty slogan or does it express a reality?

Ms Aryee: It is a reality to me.  I have been a teacher all my life and sometimes I am embarrassed when I see myself correcting something said or done by an acquaintance.

I watch TV and I observe short falls in pronunciations, the misuse of certain words or phrases, then I start correcting although they can't hear me. It seems people do not know the difference between watch and clock.

GH-H: We will discuss your last statement but not on the platform. Have you visited Accra Polytechnic since it became Accra Technical University? What changes have you observed or heard about?

Ms Aryee: Accra Polytechnic (now ATU) has changed in size and number of buildings (physical structures). Unfortunately I have not had much interaction with the staff. I am told that class sizes are phenomenal... 150 plus and lectures go on over the weekend and evenings. This has to be because of the class size.

GH-H: That must be a nightmare!           

Follow-up Q: What was the size of the largest class you handled?

Ms Aryee: 40 …that’s why I described the current large sizes as ‘phenomenal’

GH-H: In an earlier discussion you indicated you also taught in Ho Polytechnic, now Ho Technical University. How did you get into the teaching career and how many different institutions have you taught at?

Ms Aryee: After my return to Ghana I planned to work in the food service industry as a Manager or a Catering Officer, or in a hotel.

My job search revealed that managing canteens was not what I was willing to do especially when they cooked with fire wood and charcoal.  A hotel with “Fine dining" was what I desired most. Unfortunately all the hotels were fully staffed- no vacancy anywhere. Eventually I settled for a job as a teacher in a Technical Institute at Ho in the Volta region.

After a few years at Ho Tech., I was employed as a Catering Officer, stationed at Accra Poly Demo (Accra Polytechnic Demonstration) Block, catering for the then Ghana Education Service (GES) Council and its appendages.

I enjoyed this, but since I was not under the HOD (Head of Department) of Catering, I had stiff challenges which I was able to surmount. 

During this time I also taught City and Guilds students on part time basis.

In 1981, I traveled to Nigeria where I taught Hotel and Catering Management courses at the Benue Polytechnic. It was pleasant imparting knowledge to students willing to learn.

There were no challenges because everything was available... books, equipment, above all cash. I was however lonely during the long vacation since I was the HOD.

I returned to Accra Poly to continue teaching Hotel Catering and Institutional Management courses.

After my Master's I continued my work at Accra Poly., but this time, I was more involved with drafting syllabus for B-Tech for my Department (Food and Beverage).As Chairperson for the Syllabus Planning Committee I also supervised the syllabi of other hospitality courses.

Follow-up Q: Had you been trained to teach before teaching at the technical institution at Ho?

Ms Aryee: No, but during the time of teaching. GES (Ghana Education Service) organized a workshop for new teachers in technical institutions which I participated.

GH-H: In one of my introductory articles I indicated that I found teaching in the classroom to be more challenging than training in industry (on the field).

What demands did teaching make on you particularly at the beginning of your teaching career?

Ms Aryee: My first teaching post was at Ho Tech., I had just returned from abroad with new ideas and knowledge; searching for information and writing lesson notes were not difficult. Teaching ‘Practicals’ was!

Once I made a mistake making pancakes (using my own method I use at home which was different from the text book we were using in class). I corrected it with the second group.   The following week I had to correct it as well as finish the current week's practical with the first group! I learned that UNLEARNING is more difficult than LEARNING.

Getting students’ attention and helping them to understand required a lot of effort from me.

GH-H: Did you acquire an accent; a British accent?

Ms Aryee: Yes, I did, and that may have contributed to the challenge.

GH-H: Looking back, can you recall your worst and best scenarios in the classroom? What did you learn from either of them?

Ms Aryee: My worst scenario: My teaching (teaching practice) was being supervised by Garnet staff as part of the training to qualify a group of us as Technical teachers. The topic was on surface tension of water. I could tell the students were not taking in all I was saying. The questions they asked indicated that my words had fallen on deaf ears. I just had not imparted my knowledge well.

The supervisor right then, in front of the class, showed me a simple experiment to demonstrate surface tension. I was both humiliated and humbled.

My best scenario was when I wrote a paper on how to use Teaching Aids. The team (Garnet staff) decided mine was the best. They read it and showed it to everyone. This put me on my toes to keep me doing well.

GH-H: I understand you handled Food Production, Accommodation Operation, and Restaurant Service/ Food and Beverage Service.

Facilitating learning in your subject areas; Food Production, Accommodation Operation, and Restaurant Service/ Food and Beverage Service must have come with unique challenges. Taking each of the subject areas, what challenges did they pose and what unique efforts did you have to make to mitigate or lessen those challenges?

Ms Aryee: Food and Beverage Service was my forte. HND had been introduced. There were no appropriate books on BAR and Mixology. The library was not well equipped. There was no e-library either. I had to borrow books from a friend at HOTTCAT (Hotel, Catering and Tourism Training Institute) teaching the same courses.

Accommodation Operations: Front Office was new to me so I had to teach myself by borrowing books and magazines. Soft Furnishing, however was not challenging  since I loved sewing. All the same, there were a few hitches here and there.

Food Production:

I didn't handle much of this for some personal reason.

GH-H: Let’s isolate Accommodation Operations; was it strictly ‘Housekeeping’ or it included front office operations? There were three levels, the 1st year, the 2^nd and 3^rd year students. Did you see the need to vary your delivery style with each group?

Ms Aryee: At IM (Institutional Management) level, it was strictly Housekeeping. The HND level included Front Office. No, I did not see the need to vary my delivery style. The students were able to understand through questions and answers session.

GH-H: For a long time now, and indeed generally, industry experts criticize educational establishments as not being attuned to industry needs. Is this true in Ghana, particularly observing that as an industry we are far behind other countries where we get our text books to teach our students?

Ms Aryee: It seems that educational establishments are not being attuned to industry needs. This is so because the theory far supersedes the practical. Industry too has a part to play in this. When on attachment, industry does not assign students meaningful/ relevant assignment to handle.

GH-H: Learning is an active process rather than a passive one; how did you generally involve students beyond the all too familiar lecture and test regimen? How were you able to engage students for the duration to each class?

Ms Aryee: Where time allowed, I used to ask students to relate the topic to their everyday life.

Anyway, the class period was generally not adequate to have an in-depth lesson cum individual discussion.

GH-H: It doesn’t matter how well a student excels in class, somehow when they get to the industry they tend to develop a low morale due to diverse poor working conditions. How do you impart self motivation into students particularly in first year and 3^rd year students respectively?

Ms Aryee: When students go on attachment, they come back with stories affecting their morale. My advice to them have always been this: Be confident, but do not allow over confidence to set in. With the first year students, I sometimes organized them into groups to lecture on a chosen topic in the syllabus.

GH-H: What suggestions can you give current educators to integrate real service situations in the classroom?

Ms Aryee: Current educators must be confident and knowledgeable in their chosen field. More importantly, they should be able to notice gaps/loop holes in the syllabus so that they can initiate a a change/an adjustment to correspond, fit or match the needs of industry.

GH-H: Ms Aryee, thank you so much for your time.

 Ms Aryee: My pleasure.