Category: Uncategorized

Spotlight on High Impact Educational Practices: I am honored to have some of my HIEP in the spotlight on the Living Laboratory OpenLab site. Click here to see the post.

High Impact Wine Education, Blending Community, Philanthropy and Education
Making learning evident to students is valuable to their development. As a collaboration between the Julia Child Foundation, Red Hook Winery and the students in the HMGT 4997 course, Wines of the New World, we learned about wine making and blended our own wine. Here are some results!

See examples of student learning using the following links:

• Wine making team 4, 2019
• Shelf talker from 2022
• Somm Speak 2023
• Blending, Team 3, 2023

Various posts after the 2013 wine blending session were particularly thoughtful:

• Nicole’s First winery experience: see the post here
• Shows process… https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/new-world-wines-13/2013/10/24/group-5-wine-blending/
• One of the “winning” blends (white wine) and a thank you included in the reflection:
  http://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/new-world-wines-13/2013/10/21/our-experience-of-wine-blending-sunflower-bloom/

My reflection on the educational winery tour (2013):

• https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/new-world-wines-13/2013/10/21/red-hook-winery-4/#comments
• https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/new-world-wines-13/2013/10/25/photos-of-the-blending-session/

Note: this course is supported by a grant from the Julia Child Foundation. See “grants” in the scholarship section of this PARSE for more information.

The City Tech Tea Club was conceived and development over six months by two motivated students, an ambitious alumna and me as their faculty advisor. The City Tech Tea Club’s mission is to “share enthusiasm for the knowledge of tea essentials”, and that is exactly what we accomplished. As the faculty advisor to this newly formed club, I helped students establish the mission, goals and activities of the club, build an executive board, develop a marketing plan, and set expectations for meetings. Club meetings were designed to educate students on tea types, tea origins, processing, storage, history and what makes each tea unique. Club activities include the exploration of drinking tea as a social activity, and the invitation of guest speakers always keeping in mind that students attending the meetings would like to have fun while developing knowledge they can apply to their current and future professions.

As a faculty advisor, my work with students is an extension of the classroom. I mentor students through the process of recruiting members and participants, determining meeting topics, developing agenda and executing the meetings. The club leaders provide additional chances for students to hone their professional skills, they are investing in their own development while supporting their peers’ goals as well. This is special and deserves the dedication of a teaching working as a mentor.

The combination of my leadership in the beverage industry and utilization of place-based learning practices, creates a unique and effective teaching style. Recognized by Total Food Service as a Top Woman in Metro New York 2019 and 2020 and as member of Les Dames d’Escoffier since 2010, I leverage my industry leadership to help connect students with industry leaders and gain attendance to industry events like The Next Big Sip (Social Media Post Here) (HMGT 4997), meet and greets and tours of the Knickerbocker Hotel’s public and private spaces (HMGT1101), private tours of Shake Shack Innovation Kitchen (HMGT1101), and private marketing and coffee lessons at Brooklyn Roasting Company (HMGT1101).

The Next Big Sip was a hit.

Note taking is so important during the scientific process and palate fatigue can be exhausting. So, it is possible that you presented the wrong blend but it is also possible that after tasting so much wine that your palate was playing tricks on you. Either way, you conducted the process with academic integrity and teamwork. Well done.

Our Learning Community was comprised of HMGT 1101 Perspectives of Hospitality Management (Goodlad) and HMGT 1102 Introduction to Food and Beverage Management (Stewart). The 1101 class has a assignment based on the weekly New York Times 36 Hours in… in which readers are advised where to visit in a particular city or neighborhood. In Karen’s class, students were asked to choose a specific location within Brooklyn based on their assigned category of tourism. In Claire’s class, students were asked to choose one iconic NYC food item that could be found within that location.

The oral presentations were fantastic and all but two of the students ultimately followed the guidelines. The students brought examples of their food items and we ended up having a fun and educational feast!

The way the assignment was executed in HMGT 1101 was through a blog post. The instructions can be read here. Two examples of student learning show the how students can deepen their understanding of travel and tourism and show their learning in various forms of communication. The first blog post was chosen because of it’s sophistication and inclusion of links supporting what the student is writing about, I also believe the student’s writing style is inviting as she addresses all of the components of the assignment; the second blog post shows the student’s ability to evaluate a category of tourism, incorporate a variety or diverse activities, and explain what a tourist would expect when visiting Brooklyn, including lodging options.  I believe students showed great growth from previous work submitted and during an oral reflection students mentioned that the challenges were manageable and that they learned a lot about time management as well as Brooklyn.

Open Pedagogy on the OpenLab has so many benefits. One of these benefits is making students work “real” and not just a class assignment. During the Spring 2017 Wine and Beverage Management course as student’s work was recognized as impactful by an industry professional. Malika Ikramova’s Retail Wine Assignment was conducted at Slope Cellars and impressed the company so much that they took the time to comment on her experiential learning blog post. Read about what she learned here: https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/hmgt2402s17/2017/03/15/slope-cellars/#comment-76

Place-base learning is a central part of my teaching practice. In HMGT 1101, Perspectives in Hospitality Management, I take my students to visit the Carlyle Hotel. Here they meet a number of different hotel executives and receive a tour of the hotel.

Student reflections are of particular interest to the learning process and can be seen following this link. Thought the formal student learning outcomes of “Explore the roles and responsibilities of key executives and department heads in the hospitality industry.” and “Differentiate hotel classifications.” are met through this site visit the less tangible, more college ready outcomes often portray how a student is growing as a learner and future hospitality professional. Below is one reflection which shows personal growth and confidence, all reflections can be read here:

“Normally I don’t wear suits, but we had to dress professional to visit the Carlyle. The trip over there in the train was different for me, I felt like people stared at me less, I also felt a bit more respected, some people said “excuse me sir” I have never been called sir in a train station, then being around a lot of men in suits or women dress professional I felt like I was one of them and also felt like I was important with a job title or with a good paying job. Overall it was a fantastic experience being to hotel rooms that I’ll probably never be able to afford and seeing the luxury people pay thousands of dollars for.”

So much to learn, so much to share, so much to still do.

WWLS Video