As part of the National Groundhog Job Shadow Day, about 25 students at the Kaua‘i High School Academy of Travel and Tourism (AOTT), plus students from the school’s student population and Kapa‘a Middle School made their way into the community to spend part, or all of their day working with various community organizations and businesses.
Eight of the AOTT students started their day at the Kaua‘i Marriott Beach Club and Resort where they were given a brief orientation on their duties in various departments before being fitted with proper resort working attire and turned over to department head supervisors.
Neil MacDonald, head of the laundry department responsible for outfitting the ‘‘junior” workers, lamented, ‘‘No one signed up for my department.”
The Marriott assignees were placed in Concierge, Bell/Valet, Loss Prevention, Engineering, Culinary, and At Your Service, the resort’s phone central.
Jolene Ogle of the Marriott Human Resources department said that in addition to Monday’s job shadow experience, the resort will be hosting a booth at Tuesday’s Career Day event at Kaua‘i High School.
Additionally, the resort participates in ‘‘Bring Your Daughters to Work” day some time later in the Spring, an event growing out of a movement started by the Girl Scouts of America where various Girl Scouts would accompany their parents for a day of work experience.
Bryson Louis, one of the AOTT students assigned to ‘Events Management,’ said this was a good chance to see if he would pursue a career in the visitor industry, hopefully, returning to Kaua‘i one day.
Danny Aki of the Radisson Kaua‘i Beach Resort hosted approximately 50 students from Kapa‘a Middle School along with a pair of students from the AOTT, noting the students were ‘‘great!”
Jordan Ramboyon and Jessica Bran, both 11th grade AOTT students, were pressed into service as the Kapa‘a Middle School group was broken down into two groups for a tour of the resort, Ramboyan and Bran accompanied Aki and his assistant in hosting the tours, an unanticipated expectation, but in return, both students were dismissed following lunch with the hotel.
The Hyatt Regency at Po‘ipu hosted ten AOTT students for the day under the direction of Pomai Cano in the Human Resources department, and their experiences were planned to be similar to those students at the Marriott where the group would be broken down into smaller groups and individuals actually shadowing and doing hands-on work at the resort.
Other students were assigned to Hawaiian Air, Aloha Airlines, United Airlines, Hilo Hattie’s, and the Kaua‘i Visitors Bureau.
