The aim of the Faculty of Commerce, Hospitality and Tourism of Budapest Business University is to provide the training of economic professionals who are also competitive in the international environment, necessary for the success of the Hungarian economy, through high-quality knowledge transfer. Our facilities and tools help our graduates to turn their knowledge and intellectual capital into avaluable asset.
The changes currently taking place in society and the economy pose serious challenges to Hungarian higher education, and thus to the training of economists. Labour market demands are constantly evolving; the leading enterprises of the profession are looking for economists who speak at least one world language at the level required for the practice of the profession and who have practical training in addition to theoretical knowledge.
All majors taught at the Faculty are characterised by practice orientation, the practical background of our Faculty is extremely strong. Our students get acquainted with the issues of the profession not only at the seminars but also at small, medium, and large enterprises, retail-, and hotel chains, where they can learn the practical skills of the profession in a real business environment and spend their compulsory internship at leading corporations in Hungary or abroad. We also support the educational process with a number of unique solutions: simulation exercises, educational restaurants, kitchenettes, laboratory exercises, independent student projects, etc. Our programmes are also offered in dual education form in cooperation with our significant professional partners.
Candidates who apply to our Faculty have the option to choose from the following programmes: two courses in the short-cycle vocational programme - FOSZK (Tourism and Catering, Commerce and Marketing), two undergraduate majors in economics (Commerce and Marketing, Tourism and Catering), one bachelor of arts course in Community Coordination, and one in the field of pedagogy (Vocational Instruction in Business) and three majors in the Master’s Programme (Supply Chain Management, Tourism Management, Teacher of Economics). Every year, about one thousand five hundred new first-year students enter the gates of the alma mater, thus, our average number of students is around six thousand, so we are among the largest institutions in Hungarian higher education in the field of economics.
Higher educational programmes were first launched 50 years ago at the legal predecessor of the Faculty of Commerce, Hospitality and Tourism (FCHT) of Budapest Business University. As the professional and intellectual heir of the College of Commerce and Hospitality, the Faculty is now the best-known and largest higher educational institution in these fields and boasts the largest number of students. As part of BBU, which became a University of Applied Sciences in 2016, FCHT trains highly qualified professionals who think in a complex and responsible way using a multidisciplinary approach, by creating strong theoretical basis and providing a wide range of practical knowledge. The Faculty offers a training of three-stages: students can take part in the four-semester-long Short-Cycle Vocational Programme (FOSZK), the six, seven or eight-semester-long Bachelor's Programmes, and the four-semester-long Master's Programmes.
Student mobility is especially important to us. We have close relations with many foreign universities and encourage our students to take part in shorter or longer part-time studies, summer internships abroad during their years at the university. Our dual degree agreements with four European universities offer attractive opportunities to our students. International mobility and the successful language exams required to obtain a degree are enhanced by our extensive foreign language courses available in a wide range of languages and provided as part of the training.
Our goal and mission are to create and maintain an institution with an extensive international network that is attractive to both domestic and foreign applicants, and that plays a leading role in the teaching of economics and social sciences, as well as related fields. We offer short-cycle vocational programmes (FOSZK), bachelor's and master's programmes, as well as adult education programmes in both Hungarian and foreign languages. Thanks to the extensive network of contacts of the Budapest Business University, we have established cooperation with more than 200 teaching and research institutions in about 40 countries, and due to its embeddedness, the Faculty of Commerce, Hospitality and Tourism is also part of this cooperation network.
Responsible thinking is one of our Faculty's traditional values, thus, supporting our sustainable and cohesive community is a high priority for us.
In the spirit of sustainability, we are looking for opportunities for continuous renewal: several teachers and other colleagues from the Faculty are members of the Sustainability Network, and we maintain intensive researches concerning the sustainability aspects of tourism and hospitality, so that within the topic area of sustainable development our teachers and researchers may contribute to academic knowledge in certain sub-fields of hospitality and tourism, support sectoral cooperation and strengthen the sensitivity of the students (and society in general) towards the topic.
We are also actively involved in all institutional sustainability initiatives, such as volunteer programmes, and we are raising awareness of the importance of separate waste collection among university staff and students by purchasing new waste bins and setting up additional containers for separate collection at faculty level. We have been involved in the University Green Office Programme since the beginning. We consider it is very important to have a sustainability-oriented approach in education, so we have included several independent subjects on this topic in our curricula. The aspects of sustainability and responsible corporate behaviour can be examined in relation of the given subject in our educational programmes, furthermore, we encourage the preparation of theses and essays (as an outcome of taking part in the Students’ Research Society) on sustainability issues.
