Famed English writer Agatha Christie once said: “Never go back to a place where you have been happy.” For IFTM alumna Ms. Mandy Ng Weng Ian, that advice could not be more wrong. After taking part in a diploma programme at the Institute some 10 years ago, she is back at her alma mater as an evening student, to study for a bachelor’s degree. And she is once more loving the IFTM experience.
A bachelor’s degree has become in recent years a basic requirement for many roles in Macao’s tourism and hospitality. Having completed a decade ago a 2-year programme at IFTM leading to a Diploma in Hotel Management, Ms. Ng decided it was time to upgrade her knowledge.
“I had long been thinking about studying for a bachelor’s degree. It came to my mind first some 5 or 6 years ago,” she says. “In 2019, I told myself to pursue the change, so I enrolled on a IFTM evening bachelor’s degree programme.”
The Institute currently offers 3 bachelor degree programmes via evening classes, each programme using Chinese as the instruction medium. They are: Tourism Event Management; Hotel Management; and Tourism Retail and Marketing Management. The first 2 programmes were launched in evening-class format in academic year 2010/2011. Tourism Retail and Marketing Management has been offered since academic year 2016/2017.
Ms. Ng is currently a Year 2 student on the Tourism Event Management Programme. She deliberately opted to study a field not directly related with the travel sector, where she had been working for the previous 10 years. To concentrate on her studies, she also changed jobs: from working in a travel agency and leading tours both locally and overseas, she went to work for a local association.
“It was a big decision for me at the time,” Ms. Ng recalls. “My previous work was stable, and I was really familiar with all the procedures and had extensive experience on it,” she says. “Yet, getting a bachelor’s degree has long been a dream for me.”
Work experience a study advantage
Ms. Ng later moved to work for an organisation in the field of education, helping with putting on events and competitions. “These are things related to my current studies at IFTM,” she says.
With the COVID-19 pandemic impacting significantly the events industry and leading to a number of cancellations or postponements, Ms. Ng decided to step up the focus on her studies.
“During daytime, I am now working as a part-time staff member at IFTM, and I go to classes during evenings,” she says. “You can say I really spend all my days at IFTM,” she jokes.
Returning to the Institute after having amassed significant work experience has helped Ms. Ng have a better understanding of – and to be able to relate better to – most of the topics discussed in the classroom.
She now also has a deeper understanding of the importance of formal education. “We should not only aim to get the certificate; we should work for the knowledge,” Ms. Ng says. “We should have clear goals about what we really want, and we should always take the initiative to learn new things.”
‘Right decision’
Since graduating from secondary school, Ms. Ng was determined to study at IFTM. Due to personal circumstances, at the time she was only able to complete a diploma programme. “But still after so many years, IFTM remained my sole choice for study.”
Her hard work as an undergraduate is paying off in the form of good academic results. Ms. Ng’s language skills, in particular, have gained her a fair number of positive comments.
“That is because of the 2 years I spent at IFTM studying for my diploma, which helped me build my English skills,” she says. “After that, as I had to communicate with foreign customers and sometimes needed to go to other countries for work purposes, I had to be well prepared to be able to talk to others using English.”
Returning to IFTM a decade after completing her diploma studies, Ms. Ng says a lot has changed at the Institute, for the better.
“IFTM is developing very steadily,” she points out. “I can still find here many of the lecturers that taught me 10 years ago, and I can see they kept upgrading their skills and knowledge. The academic staff, administrative staff and the Institute as a whole are all proactively finding ways to improve in every aspect,” Ms. Ng says. She adds that furthering her studies at IFTM has proven to be the “right decision” for her.
