Hospitality and tourism student expectations of cooperative education

Abstract

Hospitality and Tourism students studying for the Bachelor of Business Degree in the Faculty of Business at Victoria University of Technology and being eligible for co-operative education placement in 1993-1994, completed the Work Environment Scale (WES) (Moos 1986). The data was also obtained from students studying in Accountancy, Banking and Finance, Information Technology, Retail Management and International Trade for comparative purposes. In all, 252 students responded to a mail questionnaire. Overall, the students had moderate to high expectations from their organisations' work environment. Specifically, all students expected other employees to be friendly and supportive of one another, to be concerned about and committed to their job; emphasising good planning, efficiency, and getting the job done; and expected their physical surroundings to contribute to a pleasant work environment. Conversely, the students expected their supervisors to use rules and pressures to keep employees under control and to be less supportive. They also expected their jobs to be low on variety, change and new approaches, and having less clarity as to daily routine and how explicitly rules and policies are communicated. Further analysis (ANOV A) indicated that hotel and catering course students expected the management to use rules and pressures to keep employees under control more so than travel and tourism and other business courses' students. Additionally, other business courses' students expected employees to be encouraged by management to be self-sufficient and to make their own decisions, as compared to hospitality students whose expectations of autonomy at work were less optimistic. From the results outlined above it is evident that the students, overall, expect high relationship involvement amongst employees, but are less expectant about personal growth and management involvement.

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