STA – A GAME CHANGER FOR THE ARCHIPELAGO’S HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY
(Posted 10th May 2015)
The Seychelles Tourism Academy, in short known across the islands as STA, clearly is going places and has put itself on the map. Aspiring to become the Indian Ocean’s if not Africa’s premier hospitality and tourism training institution, when the final phase of the present expansion and modernization is completed, it has signed Memorandums of Understanding and partnership agreements with other leading colleges around the world and functions today as a campus for the Shannon University after the initial four year trial period of cooperation was successfully concluded.
Phase one of the three phase expansion plan was concluded, as reported here, in July last year and phase two is soon to go underway according to Principal Flavien Joubert who has been heading the institution since it changed its name to Seychelles Tourism Academy in 2007. He did confirm that work on phase two was to commence very soon and that by the end of 2016 the second phase is expected to be handed over by the contractors to the academy for occupation and use.
The doors of the STA’ legal predecessors opened already in 1973, the institution then called the Hotel Training College at Mt. Fleuri. Thereafter it was turned into the Department of Hotel and Tourism of the Seychelles Polytechnic and it took until 1995 to transform it first into the Seychelles Hotel and Tourism Training Centre before being renamed again to Seychelles Hospitality and Tourism Training College in 1997. It was at that stage that the institution was moved to the present location in the mountains of La Misere.
The structural reforms instituted by the government of President James Michel after the world economic and financial crisis in 2007/8, which saw the entire tourism public sector undergo major changes towards private sector principles of management and performance measures, also saw the Seychelles Tourism Academy being formed in 2007 to succeed the SHTTC and the new institution was then put under the direct mandate of the equally restructured Seychelles Tourism Board, now overseen by a committee of professionals including some of the archipelagos top hoteliers.
STA is a tourism academy with arguably, no let me rephrase it, with THE best view one can imagine, set in the mountains of La Misere, a former American electronic listening installation in the Indian Ocean returned to the Seychelles’ government with the aim to use the space for educational purposes and there can be no doubt that the government in Victoria did fully live up to their side in that bargain.
(Principal Flavien Joubert seen outside his office with the Indian Ocean forming the backdrop – and one of the new Academy buildings already used for teaching)
Already are over 600 students enrolled by STA, more than twice the number before the expansion started, and when phase three is complete will this number rise to around 1.000 overall. Among the present students are at least 60 from foreign tourism and hospitality training colleges STA had signed MoU’s with. Among those are hotel schools in Shanghai, a more recent addition from Beijing, but also hotel schools from Muscat / Oman and from Malta. More recently added to this impressive partnership list was the Ecole Hoteliere de la Province de Namur in Belgium. This latest development again allows for lecturer exchanges, student exchanges and close cooperation in curriculum development, giving STA that added element of staying on top of their class by working hand in hand with other leading colleges around the world.
The partnership with Belgium will in fact pay off handsomely when in September this year another culinary contest will be held at STA for students in culinary arts, overseen by a two star Michelin chef from Brussels. The winners of the 2015 contest will, apart from other recognitions, be able to train for a few weeks in Belgium, learning from one of the best chefs in the world before returning to La Misere to complete their courses and then, no doubt about that, being snapped up by some of the archipelago’s best resorts to start their career.
Shannon University, as mentioned before, has now strengthened their cooperation with STA after a four year trial period was successfully completed. They placed one of their staff now at the La Misere campus on a permanent basis, over and above which quarterly quality control visits take place to ensure that all the right boxes remain ticked and students graduating from courses under the Shannon banner can be awarded their diplomas and degrees as if they had studied in Ireland.
Mr. Joubert used the opportunity to share more breaking news when he confirmed that initial plans to add one each 4star and 5star villa to the academy’s facilities, where hospitality students can be given hands on training, preparing them for the workplace, have been upgraded. With enough land available there will eventually be five 4star villas and five 5star villas, serving the combined purpose of providing added accommodation over and above what will become a 60 room application hotel, open for guests but equally serving as a training facility for students.
Conferencing facilities, added restaurants and other F&B outlets will then complete the expansion of the academy, equally spread over phases two and three of the re-development. Needless to say there will be a separate entrance for guests staying at the hotel and the villas, giving the entire institution a completely new outlook and turning it into the market leader they aspire to become.
In other news did Flavien Joubert also confirm that STA will soon open a campus on the island of Praslin where students from that island can enter certificate and diploma courses and more details will be made available when this added facility will be formally launched in a few weeks time.
On a more personal note has Flavien recently launched his first book ‘Seychelles Magical Cocktails’ where he expertly describes the making of 73 different island cocktails, both alcoholic and non alcoholic. The book was published in the UK by Rila Publications and for those keen to get a copy here are the respective ISBN numbers: ISBN 10:1-899839-12-7 and ISBN 13:978-1-899839-12-4.
It is understood his second book with Creole recipes is in the making too and aficionados of Creole cuisine will no doubt very much look forward to the publication of that.
Principal Joubert’s intriguing personal life and his professional career is by the way told in the current International Kreol Magazine after their editor, Ms. Georgina Dhillon interviewed him and published the story in Issue 8 (www.kreolmagazine.com)
