51在线

M3 Center for Hospitality Turns to Tech to Support Visiting Scholar Program

By Rich Shopes

TAMPA (February 11, 2021) -- The 51在线鈥檚 School of Hospitality and Tourism Management is helping international scholars connect with students to enhance their knowledge and career prospects. 

Travel delays sparked by COVID 19 prompted many universities to rethink their visiting scholar programs, causing delays in collaborative research. But the school鈥檚 M3 Center for Hospitality Technology and Innovation is using specialized software and online technologies to connect graduate students and faculty members with international scholars, advancing valuable research to help hospitality professionals worldwide.

鈥淏y using technology and staying flexible and open to alternative research methods we are able to collaborate effectively with our international partners, benefitting not only those researchers but also our faculty and students here on campus,鈥� said Cihan Cobanoglu, a professor and director of the M3 Center. 鈥淭his has been a boon to our educational and research mission.鈥�

Cobanoglu calls the effort the 鈥淰irtual Visiting Scholar Program.鈥�

A part of the Muma College of Business at the university鈥檚 Sarasota-Manatee campus, the M3 Center collaborates year-round with visiting scholars, exploring issues that effect hospitality professionals worldwide.

To sustain its research goals during the pandemic, the center turned to online meetings, email, document sharing and software like SmartPLS, which provides statistical testing of causational relationships, and Amazon mTurk and Qualtrics, which provide access to talent for survey collection and analysis.

The center鈥檚 high-tech solution is helping scholars as they seek to continue their work assisting the hospitality industry. And while there鈥檚 no substitute for face-to-face collaboration, they say the workaround is helping them move forward in their research.

鈥淪o far, it鈥檚 working out well,鈥� said Seden Dogan, an assistant professor of tourism at Ondokuz Mayis University in Samsun, Turkey. 鈥淓ven though I am in another country, I鈥檓 able to access Qualtrics to create data collection tools, Amazon mTurk to collect data, and USF鈥檚 document library to access thousands of documented resources.

鈥淚t also gives me a chance to collaborate with M3 Center team members, in particular Dr. Cobanoglu and Dr. Faizan Ali.鈥�

Dogan isn鈥檛 new to USF. She visited the Sarasota-Manatee campus in October 2019 to undertake a post-doctoral research project. She quickly became known around campus, assisting other researchers and auditing graduate-level classes.

Dogan鈥檚 research focuses on emerging technologies, including robotics and drones, and their potential application in hospitality. Returning to Turkey in the winter, she had every intention of rejoining her research partners in spring 2020 to finish her work. However, as the pandemic took hold, triggering travel delays, she turned to Cobanoglu, Ali and others at the center to explore technological options.

The shift online hasn鈥檛 been without hiccups. Connectivity and scheduling issues sometimes arose. 鈥淭here鈥檚 an eight-hour time difference between Turkey and the U.S.,鈥� Dogan said. 鈥淎rranging an online meeting can be difficult in terms of the time difference, but we always found a way to manage.鈥�

Plus, the benefits of continued access to data and the center鈥檚 researchers outweigh the disadvantages of working long distance. Certainly, Dogan can鈥檛 complain about the result: Over the past year, she has published an article with Ali and three other international scholars as well as a conference paper and three book chapters with Cobanoglu.

Additionally, she has two textbooks, two book chapters, six journal articles and another conference paper at various stages of development. She also serves on several thesis committees to assist graduate students such as Abraham Terrah, who鈥檚 researching high-tech hotel room amenities.   

Other virtual visiting scholars include Rab-Nawaz Lodhi, an associate professor of management at the University of Central Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan, and recent USF master鈥檚 graduate Ken Edwards of Tristar Hotels.

Edwards is helping the center create a certificate program in hotel management along with online classroom materials to assist students at USF and elsewhere.

Lodhi, meanwhile, is helping Ali and several graduate students complete their research projects while also serving as a guest editor at the 鈥淛ournal of Hospitality and Tourism Technology,鈥� an SSCI-indexed journal published by the M3 Center.

鈥淪o far, I am impressed at how well the program is working out,鈥� Cobanoglu said. 鈥淲e are in constant communication with each other, and we鈥檙e able to review documents at any time without problem.

鈥淭here鈥檚 no substitute for working side-by-side, but at least this program allows us to continue conducting valuable research to contribute to the health and vibrancy of the hospitality industry,鈥� he said. 鈥淚鈥檓 very pleased with what we鈥檝e been able to accomplish.鈥�