Assessment 1 Assessment task 1: Magazine article (1,800 words) Weighting: 40% Date/time/method of submission: Friday 11th March 2016 at 5pm on Turnitin Word count or equivalent: 1,800 words (+/- 10%)
Assessment criteria

: Knowledge and understanding – 30% The extent to which the article demonstrates a clear understanding of the sector, market and trends. Research and problem solving – 20% The quality of the sources used, and how well these inform the points being made. The appropriateness of sources in terms of how they are used. Analysis and evaluation – 20% How well the information gathered is interpreted, as well as the extent to which the judgements follow on from the analysis. Communication and presentation – 30% The quality of the writing, as well as the quality of the presentation and formatting.
Assessment briefing:
Accommodation providers, in particular hotels, have provided an increasing variety of facilities to attract the business tourist through the recognition that business tourism may represent a large proportion of their revenue. These facilities range from wireless internet access to meeting and conference facilities and are all designed to serve the consumer better. The focus of this assessment is to acknowledge the scope of the hotel product offering through an analysis of how innovation meets the changing needs of the business consumer. You have been commissioned by the magazine “Special Events”, for their upcoming special edition themed ‘Business Travel Matters’. They have asked you to write a feature article on how hotels can meet the changing demands of the business consumer. The magazine readership is primarily comprised of event and corporate meetings professionals, as well as a wider hospitality audience. Your article should highlight the scope of the international hotel industry in terms of scale and size, product offerings and innovation in design. It should analyse how these factors satisfy the varied requirements of the business traveller. Your article should draw upon appropriate academic theory, terminology and examples selected from hotel practices at an International level.
Guidelines The article should be 1,800 words, give or take 10%. It should contain visual material, which may include supporting pictures or graphics. While it is not essential for the piece to be ‘designed’ in terms of layout, the highest marks for presentation will go to those articles that have considered the visual layout of the piece. For these purposes, you may note that the magazine is printed in A4 format. The article should be submitted on Turnitin. Form I – Module Study Guide – Hotels and the Business Traveller – January 2016 Page 12 of 21 In order to complete this assessment, you will need to consider: The size and scope of the international hotel industry, as well as the business travel sector within it Current trends within the business travel sector How the industry is currently providing for business travellers, supported by actual examples of innovative best practice How the market is likely to change, and how hotels should best respond to make the most of these changes. Identify any examples of hotels that are already responding or anticipating these changes.
REMEMBER THAT A JOURNALISTIC WRITING STYLE IS VERY DIFFERENT FROM AN ACADEMIC WRITING STYLE.
Your audience is an informed, professional one. Therefore, you are expected to deal with complex academic issues, but explained in a simple and straightforward way. Your writing must be authoritative and informative. Being a magazine article, you are not expected to reference sources in-text using the Harvard format. However, your article MUST be informed by high quality sources, and points made must be supported with evidence. There are simple and straightforward ways you can do this that do not required a Harvard citation. For example, instead of saying: “Mintel (2015) states that total spend on business travel fell by 5% in 2014, but is expected to grow by 1% in 2015.” You could say: “The market intelligence firm Mintel found that spend on business travel fell by 5% in 2015. Their research suggests however that it is likely to grow by 1% in 2015.” The magazine editor requires that you submit your article with a bibliography, that shows the sources you have used and consulted in preparing the piece. This bibliography should use the Harvard format for end referencing. It should be included at the end, but does not have to form part of the designed article. It does not count towards the word count. Submissions should include a title page, which includes a cover page image, article headline and author name/student number. This may be included as a separate cover page, or at the top of the article depending on design preferences. You should use a san serif font, size 8-12. Font size should be used to ensure that the article fills the page appropriately. The highest presentation marks will go to those articles that use formatting features and size to ensure that the space is used to full effect. ‘Intros/Kickers’, subheadings, pull-quotes and bylines may be used as appropriate. The highest presentation marks will go to those articles that make effective use of some or all of these. If you are not sure what these are, there are many guides online that give guidance on magazine layouts. While Turnitin will accept many different file formats, you are strongly encouraged to submit your file as a .PDF file. This will ensure your design and formatting features are protected. No allowance will be made for marks lost due to formatting changes caused in the submission process. You should use the submission preview feature to ensure this does not happen. Should pictures or graphics cause your file to go over the permitted file size, these images should be compressed to a lower resolution. Images only need to be suitable for online publishing, not print quality.