On 27th June The Torrance Hotel, part of the Manorview Hotel Group, held a celebration event for local school pupils to recognise 6 months worth of work and training. Based in East Kilbride, the hotel is located in close proximity to 4 schools; Sanderson High School, Calderglen High School, St Andrew’s and St Bride’s High School and Duncanrig Secondary School. With the hotels experience in delivering high levels of hospitality, Developing Young Workforce (DYW) were keen to strike up a partnership and pass on these skills to local young people who may be looking at alternative career pathways during and beyond their years of study. This led to the Hospitality Employability Training programme being born!
On the last Wednesday of every month, 4 pupils from each of the previously mentioned high schools would take time out of their own evening, usually between 4-6pm, to go along to the hotel and get a flavour of the how a hotel operates. The pupils would spend time in each hotel department ranging from housekeeping, working with the head chef and even participating in “mocktail” making classes. Towards the end of their time in the programme they learmed all about employability and attended a CV workshop with the hotels HR department giving them valuable insight into what a hospitality employer is looking for. The experience and knowledge gained by the pupils was instrumental in helping some of them decide on future career paths. One of the pupils, Adam Macleod described the programme: “I’ve found this course to be very helpful in my understanding of the hospitality industry” Adam went on to tell us that he is now planning on going to college to study events with travel & tourism. Other students who took part have gone on to secure jobs in hospitality as a result of the experience gained with The Torrance Hotel.
”Overall the whole experience was an eyeopener from start to finish. Having a variety of children from various high schools was refreshing for them and for myself. Hospitality is not considered a career path but we have managed to convince three young adults from this group that this could be an option, one of which did work experience with us too. We covered a variety of roles within the hotel, from what is hospitality, to making a bed, mocktail making, cheffing and service styles. They were then presented with a certificate as recognition that they had taken part in this programme. We feel that offering young people employability options and some vocational training is worth while for both us as a hospitality organisation, and for the young people to experience. We will continue to work in partnership with DYWLED and to be involved in this programme from September 2018 this year once again.”
Rose Coyle, Development Executive at DYW helped facilitate the programme by working with hotel and school/pupils, attending sessions and meeting all pupils ahead of their programme start date. Rose described the programme and working with The Torrance and pupils:
“The hotel made the programme easy to facilitate and were really accommodating. We were delighted with the results and feedback received from both pupils and the hotel. The DYW programme relies on employers such as this to make that connection between employer and education. Despite the programme being voluntary there was lots of interest which is great to see and all pupils really took something from their time there.”
As a result of the success of the inaugural programme both DYW and Manorview Hotel Group were keen to build on this platform. Manorview HR department will now look to roll out the programme over all 9 of their venues with DYW providing the facilitation service again between employer and education. DYW are also looking at gaining SQA level part-qualification for pupils who complete the course which again will only help increase interest and benefits to both employer and pupils. The next programme is due to kick off in September 2018 and will again run as 2 hour sessions, 1 set day per month until June 2019, accumulating in 20 hours worth on training and experience.