Banyan Tree Partners Hong Kong’s SHTM and PolyU

The School of Hotel and Tourism Management (SHTM) at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU), and Banyan Tree Hotels & Resorts have signed two Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) to collaborate and work together in the areas of Executive Education and Internship programmes.

In the first MoU, the SHTM will provide Banyan Tree’s associates with executive education either at the SHTM or any of the Banyan Tree properties.

“One of the important roles of the SHTM is to feed research findings and other forms of expertise back to its principle base – the hospitality and tourism industry,” said Professor Kaye Chon, Dean and Chair Professor of the SHTM. “We have already formed a firm foothold in establishing well-respected executive development programmes and we strive at all times to ensure that practitioners are kept abreast of the latest findings and trends that matter.”

In the second of the MoUs, the SHTM and Banyan Tree will work together in the area of student internship and training, with Banyan Tree offering internship attachments each year to a number of SHTM undergraduates.

Banyan Tree will also offer one-year industry attachments to Chinese mainland students who are eligible for admission to the SHTM’s MSc programme on the basis that they successfully complete the attachment. Both MoUs are for a period of five years.

Mr Ho Kwon Ping, Executive Chairman, Banyan Tree Holdings Ltd, said, “Both the SHTM and Banyan Tree see this collaboration as a win-win arrangement. We get to send our associates to attend on-going skills development and job-relevant training in a hotel school that is highly regarded in Asia for its standard of excellence, as well as provide a channel for industry internship which the undergraduates will need, and also future employment in the hospitality industry for these young, aspiring students hoping to join the trade.”

SHTM is one of the world’s leading providers of hospitality and tourism education. It was ranked No. 2 in the world among hotel and tourism schools based on research and scholarship according to a study published in the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research in 2009. With more than 60 academic staff drawing from 18 countries, the SHTM offers programmes at levels ranging from Higher Diploma to Ph.D. It is designated by the United Nations World Tourism Organisation as one of its global Education and Training Centres.

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