Rio Mesa High School senior Colby Pena knows you can’t learn how to become a professional chef by reading from a textbook or taking a quiz; it requires real-world experience.

Pena is one of about 200 Ventura County high school students participating in the fourth annual Ventura County Hospitality Week, which is connecting students with local professionals to learn about various career opportunities in the hospitality industry. The weeklong event is organized by VC Innovates, a program of the Ventura County Office of Education.

Eleven hotels throughout the county are opening their doors to students from 11 high schools and Moorpark College for the event. Participants are spending several hours job-shadowing employees in various roles and networking with hiring managers. Pena, who wants to work as a chef and visited the Ventura Beach Marriott on Tuesday, said the event gave him an opportunity to learn new things about his dream job that he couldn’t have learned from just classwork.

“We’re talking to people who actually do the jobs instead of just reading about what they’re like in a book, said Pena, 18. “I get to ask questions and learn things about the industry I wouldn’t have thought to ask.”

Beyond the networking element, one of Ventura County Hospitality Week’s key focuses is doing away with the negative stereotypes often associated with jobs in the hospitality industry, according to Su-Lin Rubalcava, VC Innovates’ industry liaison for hospitality and public service. VC Innovates also hosts career events for other fields, such as health care, engineering and transportation.

Rubalcava stressed that hospitality businesses hire all manner of employees, including those looking for higher-paying work than what is traditionally offered for janitorial workers or housekeepers. The hospitality industry is one of the county’s largest job sectors, and Rubalcava noted that careers in the industry include roles ranging from travel agents to operations managers, accounting and human resources.

“Hospitality is an industry that is misunderstood, always thought of as front desk work or a cleaning lady, but there are a lot of great careers within hospitality,” Rubalcava said. “It’s great to learn about this in the classroom, but when you show them the reality of what the workplace looks like, it opens the students’ eyes and they really get engaged at a different level. It makes what they are learning in the classroom relevant.”

The Ventura Beach Marriott has participated in Ventura County Hospitality Week since the program’s inception. For the hotel, it’s a valuable way to groom potential employees, according to Rick Rossignol, executive chef at the hotel.

“This industry is hands-on, and you can’t learn it in a book,” Rossignol said. “It’s important to jump in and be exposed to the different opportunities here, whether it be accounting, sales or events. To a run a hotel, you need everything from your room being cleaned to somebody detailing your event for a wedding.”

Networking and career-building events such as Ventura County Hospitality Week are helpful for all sorts of soon-to-be graduates, even if they aren’t looking to enter the hospitality industry, according to Rio Mesa High School senior Johnalan Linhorst, who visited the Ventura Beach Marriott on Tuesday.

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Linhorst, 18, wants to be a nuclear engineer in the military and will ship out with the Navy in July. That said, Linhorst noted that he had been interested in the working in the hospitality industry before making plans to join the Navy and said the event exposed him to interesting jobs that aren’t always well-advertised.

“Just because I’m focused on one thing doesn’t mean I shouldn’t open myself to other possibilities. I’m interested in kitchens, working in a nice hotel and customer service, and this event touches on the things I like and will do later in life,” Linhorst said, adding that “hospitality is such a broad spectrum of jobs, and there is a lot more going on behind the scenes that not everyone sees.”

Source: https://eu.vcstar.com/story/money/business/2019/04/24/high-school-students-learn-careers-hospitality-industry-chefs-travel-agents/3521256002/