Pact with Aussies to give studes more work opportunities abroad

Two Australian groups are aiming to increase overseas employment opportunities in the hospitality industry for students in Cebu.

Global Skills Group Australia (GSG) and the Australia Trade Training College Ltd (ATTC) recently forged a tripartite pact with University of Cebu (UC) to internationalize the curriculum of UC’s Hotel and Restaurant Management (HRM) Program.

Courses on hospitality management based on Australian standards will be added to the existing subjects of UC’s first year HRM students who will be enrolling next school year.

Nicholas Kirke of GSG said that acquiring these courses in Australia would cost Filipino students up to P1 million a year, which is why they decided to bring the modules to Cebu.

He said they chose to focus on the hospitality industry as it would require a universal set of skills from employees as compared to other careers.

Lawyer Augusto Go, UC president, said that the alliance would open a lot of job opportunities in Australia for the school’s HRM students because upon graduation they would be issued a separate Australian Training Accreditation aside from their diplomas.

He said that the HRM students would need to add only P800 to their tuition who would be receiving these additional courses.

“This will give our next batch of HRM students a great advantage to work abroad. This is of great help to the department,” said Francis Cortes, a 2nd year HRM student of UC.

The ATTC is a non-profit organization established in 2006 by the Australian government. It is committed to provide trainings for skills shortage areas within the hospitality, business and information technology sectors in Australia and overseas.