Bachelor of Business Administration - Hospitality

The Barton School Hospitality Major will prepare students for leadership positions in hospitality and leisure industries. Knowledge and skills necessary to become effective leaders include traditional business functions plus an understanding of the unique practices of the hospitality and leisure industry. The course content of the proposed Hospitality major consists of three components:

• general education courses required of all Wichita State University graduates, • courses in the business core required of all Barton School graduates, and • eighteen hours of specialized courses required of Hospitality majors.

Course descriptions of hospitality courses:

Introduction to Hospitality Surveys of the history and ethics of the hospitality industry and includes topics dealing with hotel operations, management companies, gaming and casinos, travel and tourism, food service operations, recreation, event planning and meetings industry, tourism, floating resorts and cruises.

Special Topics in Hospitality Students will analyze management philosophies, evaluate competitive advantages and discuss strategies regarding digital implications, social media, extended living trends, new models in food services, global tourism, and future trends in hospitality and leisure services.

Applied Learning in Hospitality This course requires students to document one hundred hours of work in the hospitality and leisure industry and they will be required to identify areas of interest and analyze their observations of professional behaviors required for a successful career, discuss the importance of initiative, critical thinking and problem solving, describe effective communication skills, and assess classroom knowledge against their industry observations.

HRM in Hospitality Students will study human resource strategies in the hospitality and leisure industry. Topics include legal issues, HR planning, recruitment and selection, training and development, compensation and rewards, employee relations.

Customer Experience (CX) in Hospitality Every customer interaction provides opportunities to strengthen or weaken relationships. Students will learn how end-to-end customer experiences become strategic differentiators. Topics of study include how to: model key customer types through personal development and experience mapping, use customer experiences to drive a company’s transformation, and develop improvement plans for customer experience transformations.

Entrepreneurial Finance Students will learn how to use financial statements to report revenue flows and capital structure of a business model, employ ratio analysis to gauge performance, read income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements, project financial statements for planning, and identify financial options.