Program supports careers in tourism

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Each year, six Aboriginal students pursuing careers in the tourism industry are getting valuable work experience in the field and a bit of financial help, thanks to a partnership between the Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business (CCAB) and CHIP Hospitality, one of Canada's leading hotel management companies.

The CHIP Hospitality?Future Tourism Leaders scholarships have been awarded for the last two years, with recipients receiving $2,000 to go towards the cost of their studies.

Each student chosen is also hired on for the summer at one of the more than 30 hotels and resorts managed by CHIP Hospitality. The scholarship program is administered and distributed by the CCAB through its scholarship and bursary program.

The company is the management arm of CHIP REIT, the Canadian Hotel Income Properties Real Estate Investment Trust, with hotels and resorts across Canada and into Washington State. CHIP Hospitality launched it scholarship program in 2002 as a way to better reach out to the Aboriginal segments of the communities it serves, said Sharon Mackay, vice president of human resources services with the company.

"I guess our focus has always been that our hotels, we like to keep them very local. And so when it comes to the associates that are working within our properties, we really want to see some alignment between what we have culturally within our building and what in fact is the community surrounding it. So this is one of the ways that we thought we could do that in those markets where we do have a heavier Aboriginal customer base. We felt that it would be the right thing to do, really, to have that reflected in our staff mix at the hotel," she said.

"Primarily these are summer students that we've had so far, so all of the ones that we have had have gone back to school. But ultimately if this works the way that we'd like it to, then of course we'd like to be in a position where they would stay with us. That's the intent behind this initiative."