News

Huge congratulations to Mr. Kurt Krause, who was recently recognized as HTM’s very first Emeritus Advisory Board Member during our Advisory Board dinner on October 24th. This new membership is reserved for departing board members whose service has expanded for at least ten years and who have offered significant contributions in terms of time, talent and treasure to HTM, and concluded their voluntary service on the board in good standing. This new membership was created to honor their service but also allow them to remain engaged with the department on their own terms.

On September 19th, the Howard Feiertag Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management (HTM) at Virginia Tech and the School of Tourism Management (STM) at Sun Yat-Sen University co-hosted a webinar on "Digitalization and AI Technology for Tourism Research and Education." Approximately 40 faculty members, doctoral students, and postdoctoral researchers from both institutions attended the event.

The Pamplin School of Business at Virginia Tech has announced the appointment of Dr. Kristin Lamoureux as Director of the Master of Science in Business Administration, Hospitality and Tourism Management Program. Dr. Lamoureux, Collegiate Associate Professor of Tourism and Hospitality, is an accomplished hospitality and tourism educator and administrator. She has over 25 years of experience as a teacher, researcher, and practitioner, as well as a proven track record of fostering collaboration with industry professionals and transforming real life experience into high quality education in the US and abroad.

Dini Hajarrahmah, the current Ph.D. student in the Howard Feiertag Hospitality and Tourism Management Department at Virginia Tech, was an invited speaker at The APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) 2023 SOM (Senior Officials’ Meeting) held at the Seattle Convention Centre on August 3rd, 2023. She spoke at the Senior Disaster Management Officials’ Forum during a workshop titled: “Assessing the Impact of Rising Sea Levels on Travel and Tourism in APEC Economies.”

Under the supervision of Feiertag Hospitality and Tourism Management Professor Tom Duetsch, VT undergraduate students were crowned 1st place in the US and ranked second overall internationally in the 2021 Smith Travel Research (STR) Market Study Competition. In the last few years, the STR Market Study Competition has become one of the hallmark student research competitions in hospitality education and has attracted participation from global institutions.

Dr. Juan Luis Nicolau, professor in the Virginia Tech Howard Feiertag Dept of Hospitality and Tourism Management, won the CETT Alimara Award of Research in Tourism of the Barcelona School of Tourism, Hospitality and Gastronomy of the University of Barcelona. The Alimara award is an international award that recognizes top tourism and hospitality researchers around the world.

Fundraising for the construction of Virginia Tech’s proposed Global Business and Analytics Complex has taken another big step forward, with a $2.1 million grant from The J. Willard and Alice S. Marriott Foundation.

Florian Zach has been appointed assistant professor in the Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management at Virginia Tech’s Pamplin College of Business.

Soccer fans aren’t the only ones with their eyes on the ball during these weeks of World Cup matches in Russia.

Dr. Yusi Ding, faculty from Beijing Union University, is returning to the Hospitality and Tourism Management program at Virginia Tech after a two-year hiatus. Dr. Ding’s research focus revolves around “smart” tourism, big data analysis, and customer behavior. She is continuing her research with Dr. Phil Xiang, analyzing online reviews for hospitality organizations based in China, and extending her research engagement with Dr. Xiang and PhD student Jonilda Bahja on social media analysis.

Dr. Hua Bai, also known as Wendy, is a visiting faculty member from Shenzhen Tourism College, Jinan University. During her time in the Hospitality and Tourism management program, Dr. Bai has been engaged in both research and teaching opportunities. She and Dr. Phil Xiang are in the final stages of a yearlong research project entitled “E-Commerce Based Tourism Supply Chain Collaboration.” Dr. Bai has been exposed to new styles of teaching, which she looks forward to applying in her classrooms at Shenzhen Tourism College. Additionally, Dr. Phil Xiang’s IT and Business Analytics class has inspired her to develop a similar course at Jinan University, utilizing Dr Xiang’s textbook entitled Tourism Information Technology.

The 2018 Hospitality and Tourism Management Destinations Career Fair was a success! With over 35 vendors, a wide variety of hospitality related businesses were in attendance from across the United States. Companies were recruiting for a variety of summer internships as well as full time positions at exclusive international resorts and hotels, private clubs, professional sport venues, fine dining restaurants, franchisees, hotel management companies, and tourism destination management organizations.

The internationally ranked Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management in the Pamplin College of Business at Virginia Tech will be renamed the Howard Feiertag Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management.

Improving knowledge transfer between academic institutions and the hospitality and tourism industry can certainly be a challenge. Luckily, Howard Feiertag, longtime HTM instructor and industry icon, has a great understanding of this challenge and is eager to bridge the gap. Feiertag’s passion to find ways for Hospitality and Tourism professionals to access academic research has led him to create the Feiertag Academy-to-Industry Library Collection.