Jamaican Professor Deon Higgins joins distinguished Tourism Education Panel for CMEx Conference

KINGSTON, Jamaica – Jamaican Professor Deon Higgins is joining the distinguished panel assembled to examine the linkages between tourism and education during the 19th Caribbean Media Exchange (CMEx) on Sustainable Tourism.

The event is set to take place in Jamaica’s business capital, Kingston, from September 30 to October 4, 2010. The tourism and education linkages panel will convene at 10:45 am on Sunday, October 3, the closing day of the four-day conference at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel.

The CMEx fall meeting, being held under the theme “Tourism: Linkages for Growth,” has attracted top-level media from across the region, North America and Europe to be part of the discussions examining the Caribbean’s primary industry.

Higgins, a senior ethics consultant with Ruder Finn, Inc., the public relations agency of record for the Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB), is a Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional (CCEP). An educator, Higgins is an adjunct associate professor of public relations at Fordham University, New York City, USA, and previously served for six years as an adjunct associate professor of broadcast journalism and public relations at Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY).

Professor Higgins has worked as a consultant with United Nations agencies, including the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). She has participated in several international development conferences, and holds degrees from the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University in New York City, USA, and the University of the West Indies at Mona in Kingston, Jamaica.

“We are excited to have another outstanding Jamaican in the Diaspora return home to be part of such an illustrious panel which will explore the tourism education linkage,” said John Lynch, Director of Tourism and Chairman of the Jamaica Tourist Board. “We look forward to a lively and stimulating exchange of ideas, as we examine this important issue of education and its role in the region’s sustainable tourism efforts.”

The panel, which comprises Professor E. Nigel Harris, Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, and Lelei LeLaulu, chairman of the Leadership Council in the Department of Tourism and Hospitality Management at the George Washington University’s School of Business, will discuss the teaching of tourism and links to other disciplines, education as a means of developing tourism sustainably, and whether tourism is taken seriously enough by academia.

“Tourism education is key to reminding decision makers of the real economic value of the industry and its importance in informing the general populace how the industry directly benefits communities,” asserted Lelei LeLaulu, who also serves as vice president of CMEx.

According to LeLaulu, “Universities should be graduating thought leaders for the region’s most important industry as well as educating students about climate change, voluntourism, in addition to destination management and marketing. But first we must teach tourism at the primary school level so that the best and brightest of our youth select tourism as their first, and not last, resort for a career.”

Since 2001, CMEx has produced 18 conferences and symposia throughout the Caribbean and North America to underscore the value of the region’s largest industry, tourism, in improving the health, education, culture, environment and wealth of Caribbean communities.

The upcoming CMEx meeting is supported by the Jamaica Tourist Board and Jamaica’s Ministry of Tourism. Additional contributors include: Air Jamaica/Caribbean Airlines, Altamont Court Hotel, American Airlines, Anse Chastanet Resort, Bahamas Ministry of Tourism, Barbara Pyle Foundation, Bay Gardens Resorts, Caribbean Business Enterprise Trust, Caribbean Broadcasting Union, Caribbean Tourism Organization, CaribWorldNews, Choice Hotels International, Coco Palm, Community Benefit Development, Courtleigh Hotel & Suites, 4P Group, Jade Mountain, Knutsford Court Hotel, Marketplace Excellence, Mayberry Investments Ltd., michael D. communications, RIU Hotels & Resorts, Ruder Finn, Saint Lucia Tourist Board, Scotchies Tree, Spanish Court Hotel, Spirit Airlines, SuperClubs, St. Maarten Tourist Bureau, The Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF), The Jamaica Pegasus Hotel, Tourism Development Company of Trinidad and Tobago, U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism, Wyndham Kingston Jamaica and The SpeakEasy M.E.D.I.A. Foundation.