The elegant stairwell inside the entrance hall of Cathal Brugha DIT college is noisy and busy. Groups of students walk briskly to and from lectures. There's a sense of endeavour and industry about the place. Three students in final year take a short break to talk about their degree course in hospitality management.

Each year this career option is consistently picked as number one by a large number of second-level students in their CAO forms. Demand is high for the 60 places on offer each year. Next year's entrants will be the first to be awarded a B Sc in hosptiality management by DIT Cathal Brugha; in the past the degree has been awarded by TCD.

"I've enjoyed every minute of it," says Robert Rooney from Rathcoole, Co Dublin. "It was very tough going. We had 33 hours in first year. I choose this course because it has such a broad spectrum. For somebody who was unsure of what he wanted to do, it included so much, there are so many avenues open to you."

He's not sure yet what he would like to do next year after graduating, but he is interested in the whole area of sales and marketing."

A classmate, Geraldine O'Sullivan, from Dingle, Co Kerry, explains that as future hotel managers, "rather than just muddling our way through the day we have the advantage because we have the ability to strategically analyse things. The traditional view of a hotel manager is that you meet people, you're nice to people, but it's a business. You have to make profits and that's why the course has changed - it's so competitive an industry."

O'Sullivan is planning to go to Australia and travel. "It's a great degree to travel with - there's such a demand and Cathal Brugha is well known."

Another fourth-year, Nicola Rosney from Lusk, Co Dublin, explains that she was "already working in a restaurant from 16 onwards" so she had a background in the area. "It's the type of thing, if you start it's nearly like a vocation. It's very difficult to think of doing anything else." When she finishes the course, she hopes to do Information Technology as a postgraduate.

Rooney has found that people always misunderstand what the course is about. "They always focus on the kitchen side of it," he said. "That's still an integral part of it but it's not the main thing. Hotel managers are executives."

In first year, study includes marketing, economics, statistics and information technology. They also study either French or German. In second year, the list includes law, computer systems, human resources management and operations management.

O'Sullivan explains: "Basically, we're doing a management course. The tourism industry is so broad you can go into anything really."

Over the past three years, after a series of intensive meetings and discussions in the college and in consultation with industry representatives, the course has been redesigned to prepare students better for the increasingly competitive demands of tourism and hospitality. The new programmes started last year.

"We feel that what we're offering will be at the cutting edge and that it will contribute substantially to the industry," says Noel O'Connor, acting head of the college's hotel, tourism and catering management school. "We've changed our course very dramatically. We sought feedback from our own students and tracked down the latest developments in hospitality management."

"It's a well-rounded programme. It's a really solid business programme and it gives great flexibility. You can go into a whole range of careers on completion. It's a good education. It's very versatile. They go all over the world."

In the past, the focus was on skills and operations expertise. The newly-designed programmes place the focus on the skill of managing an operation and on maximising skills.

One of the course's newer components is the use of computers in second year which allow students to take part in a hotel simulation and "manage" their own enterprises in competition with their own colleagues. "They are effectively a board of directors," says O'Connor. "They have to find a niche market. The issues are on finding the appropriate market and they promote accordingly.

"Their decisions will be implemented on the ground. They learn to apply their marketing skills, they learn to operate as a group. It helps them in terms of developing judgement and management skills."

Another feature of the course is the immersion programme where a team of six students run one of the training restaurants in Cathal Brugha Street. The team sets its goals and objectives and has a six-week period to achieve them. There is also a strong emphasis on developing interpersonal skills.

Peter Griffin, the B Sc course leader, emphasises that students "have to participate, they have to get involved." He points out that there is a variety of careers within the domestic and international hospitality sectors from which graduates can choose. Many also go on to do postgraduate work - over a three-year period about 25 per cent of graduates go on to do further research.

Michael Mulvey, director of the college's tourism and food faculty, sees the course as "a very integrated qualification. It prepares the students for a career in the hospitality industry or, if they wish, they can go to further study. It leaves them with more options."