International Tourism with Hospitality Management with Foundation Year

This comprehensive course combines business and international tourism with a specialism in hospitality, preparing you for management roles in this rapidly growing sector. You unpack the complex nature of 21st-century tourism, while learning the ethics of managing a business, in a curriculum that covers cultural tourism, heritage management, marketing, international operations and sustainable development. There is also a focus on developing your practical skills, applying what you have learnt to real-life scenarios.

Foundation Year
In the Foundation year you will study three days per week. The focus will be on academic writing skills and numeracy, plus subject-specific content to fully prepare you for entry to an Undergraduate degree. It provides a balance between content related to your chosen subject and the range of wider skills required for undergraduate study. This is an integrated four-year degree, with the foundation year as a key part of the course. You will be required to pass the foundation year in order to progress to the first year of your degree. This course is ideal for those who do not meet our standard entry requirements or those with a non-standard educational background. It will allow you to graduate with a full undergraduate degree in your chosen subject in four years.

Facilities and specialist equipment

• Access to the Oracle Opera hospitality management programme, providing immersive simulation software.

• Our simulation software ‘Simulate’ allows you to take control of your own airline and gain key insights into airline management.

• You gain competencies in key digital skills such as Excel through SIMnet, our Microsoft Office training platform.

• Excellent Learning Resources Centre with an extensive library, giving you access to a wide range of academic and industry knowledge including e-journals, e-books and information databases as well as traditional printed books.

Your student experience

Take advantage of local industry-relevant employment opportunities such as London Luton Airport, TUI, EasyJet, Luton Hoo Hotel, and leading hotel brands such as Hilton, Ibis and Marriott.

Benefit from our Aviation Job Fair, attended by airlines and airports, providing opportunities to explore further employment or internships.

Attend talks from international tourism professionals from across the world, broadening your understanding of what is possible in the field. Recent speakers have had influential positions at EGL Tours, Enterprise Rent-a-car, London Luton Airport, Wizz Air, and the Cuban Tourist Board.

Field trips are organised in conjunction with the Student Union’s Tourism and Aviation Society and may include visits to London Luton Airport, TUI, Olympic Park and the World Travel Market.

Course modules

Year 1
Applied numeracy for business – Develop key numeracy skills vital to your future employability. Beginning your professional business journey – Take on business challenges and collaborate with peers in a professional environment. Sustainable business in tourism and hospitality – Demonstrate the ability to work effectively with others to recognise sustainability issues and challenges within the tourism and hospitality industries. Managing people in tourism and aviation – Learn people-managing skills in the commercial tourism and aviation industries.

Year 2
International hospitality operations – Analyse and explore hospitality operations in a multicultural context. Managing service in the hospitality sector – Consider the impact of service quality and its importance to the high-quality performance of an organisation. Cultural tourism and heritage management – Understand the interplay between cultural tourism and heritage management, and how these concepts can complement and conflict with each other. Marketing and digital transformation in travel and tourism – Understand the key principles of marketing, with a focus on the benefits and threats of the on-going digital transformation of marketing.

You also have a choice of five optional modules:

• Strategic business planning

• Employment law

• Data and research methods for business

• Contingency planning and crisis management

• Managing the experience economy

Year 3
Contemporary issues in the hospitality industry – Build your understanding of critical issues within hospitality, including the role of international hospitality on people, populations and places. Hospitality management in practice – Focus on your professional and personal development while building your skills in motivating others, decision making, managing conflict and 'people reading'. Managing sustainable destinations - Explore the complex global relationship between sustainability, development and a destination. Business project – Demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of the research process, critically analysing data and using it to produce an evidence-based business project.

You also have a choice of three optional modules:

• Ethics and corporate social responsibility for business

• Management and leadership

• Entrepreneurship and business excellence.

Every effort is made to ensure this information is accurate at the point of publication on the UCAS website. For the most up-to-date information, please refer to our website.

In line with the Business School's commitment to practice-based education a large part of the assessment will relate to your demonstration of your ability to synthesise class room learning with real life scenarios within the international tourism and hospitality industry. We will want to see that you understand the theory and have developed critical thinking skills which help you evaluate the relevance of what you have learned.

To assess this range of integration of theory and skills into sound practice we use a range of methods. You will be expected to complete one or two assessments per unit which depends on the number of credits allocated to the unit. You will encounter many different kinds of assessment methods for example: written exams written assignments portfolios reports individual or group oral presentations and practical skills assessment. All of which will enable you to gain valuable experience to use within the workplace.