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 or other associated activities through the College of Peers.

These workshops support colleagues in implementation of the Standards in their institutions building on the work of:

• The Setting the Standard: Establishing Threshold Learning Outcomes (TLOs) for Tourism, Hospitality and Events Higher Education in Australia project, lead 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.
• The Tourism, Hospitality and Events Learning and Teaching Academic Standards Higher Education, published in June 2015, the outcome of the above project, is a set of nationally agreed upon and clearly articulated TLOs for tourism, hospitality and events higher education coursework programs at Australian Qualification Framework bachelor (level 7) and coursework masters (level 9).

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. Quality aligned with:

• The tourism, hospitality, and events threshold learning outcomes
• The Australian and New Zealand higher education standards and frameworks

2026 workshops

Showcasing educational excellence – 9 February 2026

Date: Monday 9 Feb 2026
Time: 9:00-17.00
Venue: Torrens University Australia, Wakefield Campus, Adelaide City (88 Wakefield Street, Adelaide CBD)

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 key moments that demonstrate your journey and explore ways to showcase achievements for awards, promotions and fellowships.

2025 workshops

Programmatic assessment, teaching, and learning workshop – 31 October 2025

An online workshop will be held from 11.00am-1.50pm (AEDT) on Friday 31 October with a focus on programmatic learning and teaching, using assessment as a means to demonstrate the concept. To activate our understanding of programmatic assessment, we will work on three assigned units (subjects, papers, modules) across year-levels, and assigned two TLOs. WORKSHOP OUTLINE

Activating and collaborative learning for engaging classrooms – 10 February 2025

Held on Monday 10 February 2025 from 9:00-15:00pm at the UQ City Campus, Brisbane 21 pre-conference delegates enjoyed this workshop focussed on the principles for designing active, collaborative, and engaging learning and a design for activating and collaborative learning within a unit/subject, and a framework for topic learning. VIEW AGENDA

2024 workshop

Designing and demonstrating advanced student learning – 6 February 2024

Held on Tuesday 6 February 2024 from 9:00-15:00 at The Hedberg, Hobart prior to the CAUTHE 2024 Conference. Accreditation requires institutions evidence that the students engage with and achieve advanced knowledge and inquiry. ‘Advanced’ is based upon the level of study and the expected learning outcomes. Crucially, the ‘expected learning outcomes’ incorporate the tourism, hospitality and events threshold learning outcomes (The Standards). In this workshop we unpack what ‘advanced’ means and how this is demonstrated. Using this as a framework, we then look to assess and modify a unit’s outcomes, content, and learning activities to align with the expectations. Outcomes from this workshop include an understanding of how advanced learning and inquiry is characterised, the capacity to assess the demonstration at a unit level, and the means to address evident gaps in these profiles. VIEW AGENDA

2023 Workshops

Staff sufficiency: Understanding, assessing and developing staff sufficiency – 27 July 2023

Date: Thursday 27 July 2023
Time: 13:00-16:00 (AEST)
Location: Online via Zoom

In this workshop participants will be guided through accreditation ‘staff sufficiency’ needs. Staff sufficiency is a combined demonstration of educators’ discipline or field qualifications, research or industry achievements, and educational expertise. A fictional institutional case study will be used to explore the nuances of assessing staff sufficiency, identifying gaps, and prioritising short-term actions. Using the assessment outcomes, development plans for long-term staff sufficiency will be crafted. VIEW AGENDA

Implementation of the standards at my institution: Understanding the enablers and barriers for adoption – 24 February 2023

A workshop on Implementation of the standards at my institution: Understanding the enablers and barriers for adoption was held on Friday 24 February | 1:00-3:00pm (AEDT) via Zoom. VIEW AGENDA

2022 workshops

Mid-Year JHTM Special Edition workshop – 22 July 2022

The 2022 Mid-Year TH&E Standards Workshop will be held online from 14:00-16:30 pm on Friday 22 July. The purpose of the workshop was to develop a JHTM Special Issue plan. The goals and expectations were outlined by the Editor-in-Chief and Special Issue editors. Members self-allocated into topic area groups, craft ideas, gain feedback, and develop a paper plan. A timeline for completion was developed.

Best practice in academic staffing: Auditing, mapping, and developing staff knowledge, skills, qualifications – 3 February 2022

This workshop continued the work of 2020-2021 Course and Assessment Design workshop series, in which the threshold learning outcomes journey, from course design to benchmarking was tracked. This workshop focussed on accreditation, including academic staffing: qualifications, professional experience, scholarly activity, and the related maintaining of these; a common demonstration challenge.The workshop was held in the week prior to the CAUTHE 2022 Hybrid conference. There was no charge for registration for CAUTHE members or one Chapter representative from each institution if attending the workshop only.

Resources

• Assessment Design Principles
• THE Comprehensive Rubric
• Detailed assessment examples of how educators can document students’ mastery of the agreed upon TLOs through various curriculum, pedagogy and assessment practices.

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

Assoc Prof Glen Croy Monash University