Gallatin College MSU launches hospitality program
The 30-credit certificate will prepare students for fields ranging from hotel management to culinary arts.
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News from Frankie Beer, MSU News Service
BOZEMAN — Nearly 14 million people visited Montana in 2024. They spent $5 billion exploring national parks, riding through dude ranches and sampling menus at mountaintop resorts.
Starting in August, Gallatin College Montana State University will train students to house, guide and feed the state’s tourists and other travelers with a one-year hospitality certificate. The certificate provides baseline knowledge of business communication, culinary arts, hotel management and more, said program manager Meredith Allen.
The program received $1 million in funding from the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation, which also supported plans to construct a new Gallatin College MSU building on the MSU campus.
“In partnership with the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation, we are proud to support one of the largest industries in our state by offering education and training, as well as a steppingstone to four-year hospitality programs at MSU,” said Stephanie Gray, dean of the college.
The hospitality program is a collaborative effort between Gallatin College MSU, the Jake Jabs College of Business and Entrepreneurship and the College of Education, Health and Human Development. Gallatin College MSU students in hospitality or culinary arts programs will take classes alongside MSU students and can count their credits toward a four-year hospitality management degree, with options in hospitality business and sustainable hospitality.
“We all have the same goal, and that’s creating and being a part of a thriving hospitality industry in Montana that’s led by Montanans,” said Allen, who has worked for ranches, hotels and restaurants across the U.S. for more than 20 years.
Students can work for Montana organizations through the program’s internship requirement, which is completed as a semester-long course. Allen said it will be much easier for students to integrate with a team after graduation “if they’re speaking the same language from day one.”
Communication between staff members and upper management is a central component of the program’s courses, such as the hospitality supervision and customer service class taught by Celeste Carducci, an adjunct professor in the College of Education, Health and Human Development. She has instructed the class for two years at MSU and said she is excited to share her love of the industry with incoming Gallatin College and MSU students.
“The hospitality industry has all these different forms of communication, and we try to fine-tune students’ skills so they can discover what type of learners they really are,” she said.
Carducci spent more than 35 years in the hospitality field, including working with the hotel chain Marriott in Washington, D.C., and starting her own bed and breakfast in Napa Valley, California.
In her hospitality course, students’ experiences run the gamut as well. They will tackle case studies about solving conflicts between staff members, calculating labor costs for a hotel and planning a holiday dinner menu.
“We’re encouraging students to explore a world beyond the front desk, and we’re shaping employees who industry members will be proud to work alongside,” Allen said.
