Tell us about your education establishment and what you offer your students.
With 3,000 students from more than 50 countries, Stenden Hotel Management School is the largest and most internationally oriented hotel school in Europe. Stenden HMS has over 30 years’ experience in teaching in Hotel Management.
We offer undergrad students a bachelor’s degree programme and an associate’s degree programme in Hotel Management. Our Work & Study programme is very popular amongst our 21+ students. And Stenden HMS also provides students interested in continuing their studies with the opportunity to pursue a master’s degree in International Hospitality & Service Management.
We continually encourage our students and ourselves to gain knowledge, develop talents and learn to be agile in a fast-paced and rapidly changing world. Our Dutch-founded hotel management school has a global mindset and campuses across several continents.
We educate our students to be future-proof game changers in the hospitality industry and beyond. A young professional with a solid knowledge base, who can strategically anticipate changes and who has a positive impact on tomorrow’s world.
How do you help attract people to build a career in hospitality?
We believe that the world today calls for people who are prepared to give. People who understand the art of making others feel welcome. We call this hostmanship. Hostmanship is at the heart of our programme and goes beyond just hospitality. It is a mentality; a drive to combine a desire to serve, genuine attention and leadership into an inspirational outcome. Our study programme uses the concept of Design Based Education, with the personal development and skills of the student as the focal point throughout.
We encourage our students to travel the world by going on ‘Grand Tour’ and do part of their studies at one of the international Grand Tour locations. We have more than 100 partner universities worldwide and 600 industry connections in over 40 countries around the world.
Throughout their study programme we offer our students practical hours in our school-owned and recently renovated 4-star Stenden Hotel to gain practical experience from operational to management level. During their practical training our students are dressed for the occasion, wearing sustainable and unique workwear By Rockland, which supplies workwear for the hospitality industry in collaboration with Dutch designers. This prepare them for the 10-month management internship in their final year – before becoming a game changer in the hospitality industry!
What has been your biggest success story?
Stenden HMS has been able to attract 800 new students this year, despite COVID19! These students are spread among our programmes from our bachelor’s degree to our a 2-year associate’s degree to our master’s degree programme. During COVID-19 Stenden HMS has set up its own studio for virtual learning through mastersclasses, an Online Industry Fair, the Student Start Week and so much more. Our academy is committing a 100% to keeping our students on track.
The hospitality industry has been hit hard recently and still has a long and, above all, new road ahead of it. That does not scare the young generation. The game has changed and then there is only one thing we can do as a school: train tomorrow’s ‘Game Changers’!
What do you think is the ideal recipe to encourage learning and self-development?
We understand that teaching is about more than simply passing on information. Stenden HMS stands for making and maintaining intense connection with qualified lecturers, professionals from the industry, and the research institute. Through Design Based Education, we don’t use a classical system of education, we embrace that students have the propensity to be flexible and decide on their own learning path, whereby they are better prepared for a fluid and dynamic world: a world where professions and positions come and go.
Identify three personality traits students should have to succeed in hospitality and explain why they are the most important.
Motivation, talent and attitude are the most important criteria for selecting our students. It is about you, not your background or origin. We prepare our students to work in a complex multi-level environment by giving them a rich and diverse toolkit with both hard and soft skills. A Stenden HMS student sees the value of his fellow man as the core of his being. A hostmanship talent who makes the difference by always keeping the big picture in mind and is able to make and underpin high level decisions.
Share any interesting stories about your establishment e.g. history, famous students etc.
One student that comes to my mind right away is alumnus Niek van den Adel, aged 28. Niek takes a nosedive while riding his motorcycle. It causes paraplegia, leaving him paralysed from the chest down. Plus something extra: he has a syrinx, a cavity within the spinal cord that continuously threatens the body parts that do still work.
According to Niek, paraplegia and a syrinx are the perfect combination for only the toughest guys. But as long as you can live with it, you’d better do so, he says. And in that case, you’d better do it good. So eight years later, he is married to his occupational therapist, has become a dad of three beautiful daughters, built a sustainable house, delivers speeches to thousands of people as a coach and motivator, teaches senior-level executives about inclusivity and writes an insanely popular blog.
His motto: happiness is not in your legs. Happiness is a choice.
This is the spirit that kept this incredibly strong man going. Stenden HMS couldn’t agree with Niek more! Niek is resilient and inspiring. This is the spirit that we as a hotel school are looking for in our (future) students. This is the spirit that sets our students apart. This is the spirit that creates tomorrow’s Game Changers.
Which aspects of your membership of the Institute have been the most useful to you, your establishment and your students?
As an internationally focused educational establishment with campuses in The Netherlands, Bali, Qatar, Thailand and South Africa we particularly appreciate the global perspective that the Institute of Hospitality has. Our 3000+ hospitality management students come from and travel to all corners of the world.
The library resources are excellent support for student assignments and staff research projects. The Management Guides are very helpful as a teaching resource as we try to ensure that our students get a real feel for what kind of decisions managers in the hospitality industry are grappling with. Staff value the ability to use MIH after their names and are encouraged to use these on business cards etc.
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