Stepping into a hotel, one of the first faces tourists see is the concierge’s behind the front desk, ready to check them in with a smile. At a theme park, the staff clad in cheerful attire is prepared to seat vacationers on the rides, reminding them to keep their arms and legs inside.

The employees in tourism and hospitality are people who not a lot of travelers think much about, but Central Connecticut’s Tourism and Hospitality Studies major is trying to change that tomorrow, Sept. 27, on World Tourism Day.

“[We want to] raise awareness for tourism and the whole industry of tourism,” Dr. Jeffrey Kreeger, the major’s director, said. “One in five jobs is going to be in tourism and hospitality in the next 20 to 30 years.”

The department will have an easel and table set up in the Social Sciences Hall lobby to engage students with the major. CCSU is one of two campuses in the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system—Southern being the second—to offer a four-year program in the field to students, and Kreeger wants to get the word out about it.

“If there was such a degree when I was going to school, I would’ve definitely jumped on that. I mean, get a four-year degree in fun? If people are more aware of it, I think they’ll choose it over a major that they’re not that happy about,” Kreeger stated.

Krisztian Juhasz, a student in the major, can attest to enjoying the program. Pursuing a career as a route analyst in aviation, Juhasz said that International Studies and Hospitality allows him to supplement statistics with an understanding of a consumer, giving him a skillset to be more personalized with customers. 

Additionally, Juhasz said that he likes how “customizable” the program is.

“I get to take a lot of classes that directly relate to what I want to do,” Juhasz said.

Tourism, especially on an international scale, is booming, representing more than 10 percent of the global GDP in 2017, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. In Connecticut, tourism is a $4 billion-a-year business and represented 119,000 jobs in 2015, according to The Connecticut Economic Digest.

For Dr. Eva Happ, a visiting scholar from Hungary, which is World Tourism Day’s host country this year, these numbers are important to relay to students. As the head of the tourism department at Széchenyi István University in Gyor, she hopes that educating Central undergraduates in the industry’s opportunities will encourage them to give the major a try and add on to its current 70 students.

“It’s not only about hotels or accomodations,” Happ said. “It’s about travel, travel agencies, tourism destinations, management and marketing. So, there’s a lot of possibilities to have a good job in tourism and hospitality.”

Kreeger chimed in, reminding interested students that a degree in tourism and hospitality isn’t simply being the smiling face ready to give visitors a key card to their room.

“People think that a lot of tourism and hospitality jobs are really just menial jobs like being a housekeeper in a hotel or being a server at a restaurant. Those are very good jobs, but the people who are in those jobs won’t be able to get beyond being just a server or a housekeeper,” Kreeger explained. “What they really need is a degree to move up the ladder. The degree allows students not to spend the rest of their lives as a bellman or a concierge unless they want to. It allows them to be the general manager or have a higher-paying job because of their education.”

“I tell my students, ‘You’ll not only have a job, but you’ll have a good job,'” he continued.