There are a hundred and a half, but there were requests for many more. Students from the School of Hospitality and Tourism of the Algarve have recently started to carry out internships in companies in the sector, in the Algarve, responding to a major problem in the region and its main industry: the lack of manpower, mainly qualified.
At a time when the tourism sector is having the best indicators in decades, the employability rate of EHTA students, six months after their training, «is 70,7%», according to the Professional Insertion Study prepared by Turismo from Portugal.
Cuisine, Pastry, Bar and Restaurant, Hotel Accommodation, Tourism are the areas in which companies in the sector were strengthened.
Many of these young people end up working where they do their internship, which lasts for three months.
The students even had the possibility of «making a more autonomous choice of their internship and adapting it to their career expectations», since there were about «two hundred companies that offered internships to EHTA students».
According to Paula Vicente, director of the Algarve Hotel and Tourism School, «not only do we need to attract young people to Tourism, but we also need to attract them to study in these professions, which continue to be challenging, but also very promising for our young people”.
«Curricular internships therefore play a fundamental role as they are, for many, the first contact with the sector and it is crucial that this experience be as positive as possible and that it results in the desire to continue studying and to develop skills that most will later be absorbed by companies. We have had an excellent relationship with the business fabric that welcomes our students and thus complement the training provided at the School throughout the school year », he says.
With a duration of 3 months and covering a good part of the high season, the internships in both level 5 courses (post secondary education) and professional courses (after 9th grade) integrate students into a real work context and also represent support for sector companies.
According to the Professional Insertion Study 2022, carried out by the Training Directorate of Turismo de Portugal and now published, the professional insertion rate of students in the set of 12 schools that make up the network of Escolas do Turismo de Portugal, 6 months after training, rose to 76% compared to 2021. 32% found a job in the very place where they carried out the internship.
These are positive numbers taking into account the post-pandemic conjecture and the recovery of the sector that has been taking place, year after year.
«There is an increasing concern on the part of entities to provide a good reception and follow-up of interns, in order to be able to attract these students later on. In this way, they are able to bridge with this specialized and highly qualified workforce to join their teams», says Maria Eduarda Freitas, from the Department of National Internships and Erasmus at EHTA.
Since April 1, the application phase for national students has been running.
There are already 189 applications for the 115 vacancies available at the School of Hospitality and Tourism in the Algarve, with some courses registering a huge demand, such as the professional courses of Kitchen/Pastry Technician and Restaurant/Bar Technician and the level course 5 Restaurant and Beverage Management.
The EHTA renewed its training offer this year, with the opening of the Tourist Information and Animation Technician course for students who finished the 9th year, and the Tourism Management course, the English version of the current Tourism Management course – a course which will be fully taught in English and is intended for those who already have the 12th year. Next year, the Pastry Management and Production course will also be relaunched.
Applications to the Escolas do Turismo de Portugal are open to national candidates who want to enroll in courses at level 4 and 5 and can be done here.
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