Four new lecturers boost CDU Alice teaching team

A career educator with a background in tourism and a love for rugby union has been appointed the new team leader for Tourism and Hospitality at Charles Darwin University in Alice Springs.

Michael Keating, who takes on responsibility for commercial cookery, hospitality, butchery and tourism, joins CDU from Batchelor Institute, where he had been an academic support advisor.

“I’ll be approaching 2015 with a steady as you go approach and a view to continuing to do well what we do,” Mr Keating said.

“My predecessor has left a good legacy, having built a strong team with a track record for delivering good outcomes.

“We will again operate the Desert Lantern training restaurant throughout the year, with the expectation of maintaining the high standard of delivery that our patrons have come to expect.”

Mr Keating said he looked forward to getting back to teaching and tourism.

He said he would draw from his general interest in tourism as well as the experience gained at the Australia Pacific Technical College in Vanuatu where he was the Tourism Course Coordinator.

With a degree in tourism and recreation, Mr Keating also has worked at the Blue Mountain International Management School, and at the Bankstown District Sports Club, one of the biggest clubs of its type in the world.

He was a rugby union player of some repute in the Hunter Valley, NSW, and although long retired, maintains a healthy interest in the sport.

CDU has welcomed three other new full-time lecturers to the teaching team at Alice Springs campus. They are:

• Rhonda Drew, who will teach certificate I, II and III courses in English as a Second Language to migrant students
• Lee Caruana, a man with more than 20 years’ experience in trades, who will teach construction apprentices, and secondary students under the Vocational Education and Training in Schools program
• Phil Gates, who will teach Conservation and Land Management in Alice Springs, Tennant Creek and some communities.