|
Kalsom Kayat is Professor of tourism management currently attached to Othman Yeop Abdullah Graduate School of Business. She received her PhD in Parks, Recreation and Tourism Resources from Michigan State University and her Master of Science as well as Bachelor of Science Degrees in Economics from the University of North Texas. Being in the academia for almost 20 years, Prof Kalsom has been teaching, researching and writing in the areas of tourism management, tourism policy, and tourism planning especially on issues related to community participation and development. Her research interests include tourism impact, resident involvement in tourism, rural tourism, tourism policy, and community-based tourism. Since 2000, she has been fascinated by what people expect and get from tourism, in particular from the homestay programme in Malaysia which is categorized under community-based rural tourism. Her research has been influenced by social exchange and power theories which explain acceptance of tourism. She's also interested in policies formulation relating to tourism. Her passion is shared by the many post-graduate students that she has had the privilege to work with. She has engaged in more than 20 research projects, receiving grants from MOHE and UUM. She has published more than 20 refereed papers and presented more than 40 papers at local and international conferences many of them cited by researchers in the field of tourism. Over the last 24 years at UUM, she had served as the Director of Research and Innovation Management Centre, Deputy Dean of the School of Tourism, and Deputy Dean of the School of Management. Since 2002, she has been involved in the training of in the areas of tourism management, homestay management and operation, and tourism policy. In training the homestay operators, she and her colleagues integrate theory, research, and practice to empower them to improve their operations and product offerings. She headed several policy-related consultancies for the Ministry of Tourism, the Malaysian Tourism Promotion Board, and State Economic Planning Units. At the national level, she is one of the MyRA auditors for MOHE.
|