The Dublin Institute of Technology gobbles up many students looking to work with food and hospitality, with Level 7 and 8 courses in culinary arts, culinary entrepreneurship, Bar management and baking and pastry arts management as well as a range of degree programmes in leisure, tourism and event management.
There are Level 6, 7 and 8 courses in culinary arts and hospitality subjects across the IoT sector, such as the two-year BA in culinary arts at IT Tallaght. See qualifax.ie for a full listing.
If you’re looking for total immersion in hospitality culture, Shannon College of Hotel Management is a dedicated hotel management college and offers degrees in hotel management and business studies. With two separate work placements as part of the degree, students may be placed in one of the college’s 100 partner hotels in 16 countries such as France, Belgium or Germany, while the final year placement may be further a field in locations such as Dubai, China and Graduate Edward Stephenson has just become CEO of the five-star Druids Glen resort in Co Wicklow and graduate Mark Meaney is general manager of the five-star Conrad Centennial Hotel in Singapore.
The School of Tourism at Letterkenny Institute of Technology in Killybegs, Co Donegal, is the oldest campus dedicated to hospitality, tourism and culinary arts education and training outside Dublin. The college has turned beautiful Killybegs into a campus town for culinary scholars, with its own training restaurant open to the public.
Throughout the past 45 years, the college has gained an international reputation for the education and training of chefs in particular: Rory Carville is known for earning a Michelin star for Lock’s Brasserie in Dublin, and for his new venture in the Clarence Hotel. UK-based chocolatier Gerard Coleman is known for this L’Artisan du Chocolat, near Sloane Square in London.
The college has one of the few honours degrees in culinary arts where students can develop artistic and scientific skills required of new and innovative restaurants. Expertise in molecular gastronomy, modernist cuisine, chocolate and pastry, artisan food product development and food business entrepreneurship can be developed at undergraduate and postgraduate level.
The college is also embarking on an ambitious programme to make food science and research opportunities available to students interested in large scale, commercial food production. A new programme, a BSc (Hons) in Culinary Arts and Food Technology, is combines the organoleptic (aspects of food felt by the senses) skills and competencies of culinary arts with the scientific knowledge and precision of food technology. Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM) has a research and training grant for students doing seafood research in Killybegs or product development at their facility in Clonakilty.
