TH&E Academic Standards

Meeting the Standard for tourism, hospitality & events

As custodian of the TH&E Learning and Teaching Academic Standards, CAUTHE’s College of Peers facilitates workshops that help colleagues build capability and enhance quality in tourism, hospitality and events higher education.

The College of Peers

Supporting the Standards in practice

As the ‘custodian’ of the Tourism, Hospitality and Events Learning and Teaching Academic Standards Higher Education, the CAUTHE College of Peers facilitates workshops focussed on Meeting the standard for tourism, hospitality and events — for assessment design, benchmarking and other associated activities.

These workshops support colleagues in the implementation of the Standards in their institutions, building on the foundational work below.

Project · OLT-funded 2013
Setting the Standard project

The Setting the Standard: Establishing Threshold Learning Outcomes (TLOs) for Tourism, Hospitality and Events Higher Education in Australia project — led by Paul Whitelaw, Pierre Benckendorff, Judith Mair and Michael Gross — developed material, information and resources as part of the academic standards project funded by the Office for Learning and Teaching (OLT) in June 2013.

Published · June 2015
The Standards

The Tourism, Hospitality and Events Learning and Teaching Academic Standards Higher Education, published in June 2015, is the outcome of that project — a set of nationally agreed upon and clearly articulated TLOs for TH&E higher education coursework programs at AQF bachelor (level 7) and coursework masters (level 9).

Held twice a year, aligned with:

TH&E Learning & Teaching Academic Standards

A set of nationally agreed upon, clearly articulated Threshold Learning Outcomes for tourism, hospitality and events higher education coursework at AQF level 7 (bachelor) and level 9 (coursework masters).

Workshops

Building capability, year on year

The workshops are usually held twice a year, with the primary focus to build capability and enhance quality in tourism, hospitality and events higher education.

Showcasing educational excellence

  • Monday 9 February 2026
  • 9:00 – 17:00
  • Torrens University Australia, Wakefield Campus, Adelaide City (88 Wakefield Street, Adelaide CBD)
2026 Workshop

Build your capability to showcase education practice, innovation, scholarship and leadership in tourism, hospitality and events.

Work with colleagues to craft a coherent education narrative, identify the key moments that demonstrate your journey, and explore ways to showcase achievements for awards, promotions and fellowships.

Past workshops

31 October 2025 · Online
Programmatic assessment, teaching, and learning

An online workshop (11:00am–1:50pm AEDT, Friday 31 October) focused on programmatic learning and teaching, using assessment as a means to demonstrate the concept. Participants worked on three assigned units across year-levels and two assigned TLOs.

10 February 2025 · Brisbane
Activating and collaborative learning for engaging classrooms

Held Monday 10 February 2025, 9:00–15:00 at the UQ City Campus, Brisbane. 21 pre-conference delegates explored the principles for designing active, collaborative and engaging learning, a design for activating and collaborative learning within a unit/subject, and a framework for topic learning.

6 February 2024 · Hobart
Designing and demonstrating advanced student learning

Held Tuesday 6 February 2024, 9:00–15:00 at The Hedberg, Hobart, prior to the CAUTHE 2024 Conference. The workshop unpacked what ‘advanced’ knowledge and inquiry means and how it is demonstrated, then assessed and modified a unit’s outcomes, content and learning activities to align with the TH&E threshold learning outcomes.

27 July 2023 · Online
Staff sufficiency: understanding, assessing and developing

Thursday 27 July 2023, 13:00–16:00 (AEST), online via Zoom. Participants were guided through accreditation ‘staff sufficiency’ needs — a combined demonstration of educators’ qualifications, research or industry achievements and educational expertise — using a fictional institutional case study to identify gaps, prioritise actions and craft long-term development plans.

24 February 2023 · Online
Implementation of the standards at my institution

A workshop on understanding the enablers and barriers for adoption was held Friday 24 February, 1:00–3:00pm (AEDT) via Zoom.

22 July 2022 · Online
Mid-Year JHTM Special Edition workshop

Held online 14:00–16:30, Friday 22 July, to develop a JHTM Special Issue plan. Goals and expectations were outlined by the Editor-in-Chief and Special Issue editors; members self-allocated into topic area groups to craft ideas, gain feedback and develop a paper plan, with a timeline for completion.

3 February 2022
Best practice in academic staffing

Continuing the 2020–2021 Course and Assessment Design workshop series, this session tracked the TLO journey from course design to benchmarking, focusing on accreditation including academic staffing — qualifications, professional experience and scholarly activity. Held the week prior to the CAUTHE 2022 Hybrid conference; no charge for CAUTHE members or one Chapter representative per institution attending the workshop only.

Resources

Tools to support implementation

Assessment Design Principles

Principles to guide the design of assessment aligned to the Standards.

THE Comprehensive Rubric

A comprehensive rubric to support benchmarking and assessment against the TLOs.

Assessment examples

Detailed examples of how educators can document students’ mastery of the agreed TLOs through curriculum, pedagogy and assessment practices.

The People

The College of Peers

The College of Peers, formed in August 2016, is comprised of participants from CAUTHE Chapter member institutions and individual CAUTHE members — many of whom were involved with the original Setting the Standard project. For more information, or if you are interested in participating in Meeting the Standard for tourism, hospitality and events, contact the CAUTHE Secretariat.

Founding co-ordinators

Dr Paul Whitelaw (William Angliss Institute) and Assoc Prof Pierre Benckendorff (The University of Queensland)

College of Peers Co-ordinators

  • Dr
    Mieke
    Witsel

    Southern Cross University

    Dr
    Mieke
    Witsel
    Committee Member Contact
  • Assoc Prof
    Glen
    Croy

    Monash University

    Assoc Prof
    Glen
    Croy
    Committee Member Contact
Get Involved

Interested in Meeting the Standard?

To learn more, join a workshop, or participate in the College of Peers, please contact the CAUTHE Secretariat.