Twenty-seven students from three universities—Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), the University of Guelph, and the Université du Québec à Montréal/Institut de tourisme et d’hôtellerie du Québec (UQAM/ITHQ)—recently gathered to compete in the annual Hospitality and Tourism Case Competition. Organized this year by TMU’s Hospitality and Tourism Students’ Society, the event offers students the opportunity to showcase their analytical and presentation skills, connect with industry representatives, and apply classroom learning to a real-world scenario.
Teams of three compete in either the Tourism Stream or the Hospitality Stream. The case at the centre of the tourism segment was built around Adventure Canada, a family-owned Arctic expedition cruise operator that runs ice-class vessels through remote northern waters with a 1:7 staff-to-guest ratio. Students were asked to act as external consultants tasked with designing a “Response and Recovery Module” for the company’s 2026 onboarding program for first-time Expedition Leaders—the on-board bridges between safety, guest experience, and respectful engagement with Indigenous communities.
The Challenge: People, Pressure, Professionalism
Two scenarios formed the basis of the challenge. In the first, an otherwise technically brilliant team member loses their composure during a rapidly deteriorating weather landing, yelling at elderly and mobility-limited guests on rocky terrain while colleagues and guests watch. In the second, a guest ignores explicit briefing instructions, approaches a tied sled dog in an Inuit hamlet, and gets bitten. The dog’s owner responds angrily—and it’s all captured on camera by a social media influencer, with the visit still ongoing.
Both scenarios demand exactly the kind of judgment HR professionals spend careers thinking about: how do you train for emotional regulation under pressure? How do you build leaders who can de-escalate, communicate across cultural lines, and protect an organization’s reputation in real time—sometimes without connectivity, without backup, and without a second chance?
Students as Consultants
Five teams competed in the Tourism Stream, each presenting their proposed module design to a panel of industry judges that included Kaleigh Collinson of Adventure Canada, Isabelle de Bruyn of Tourism HR Canada, and Sandra Bahoua of Alma Care.
The module had to fit within one to two days of a four-day in-person onboarding session, incorporate both workshop and online pre-work components, and be immediately applicable to small cohorts of new Expedition Leaders.
The Tourism Stream was won by TMU’s Allie Bell, Libby Worden, and Emel Balaban, who reflected afterward that the team “spent a lot of time preparing, challenging each other’s ideas, and refining our approach”. Meanwhile, the Hospitality Stream title went to UQAM/ITHQ’s team Capella: Léa Porlier, Elizabeth Pache Duran, and Samy Zellat, coached by Professor Sylvain Drouin. University of Guelph competitors, coached by Professor William Murray, earned second-place finishes in both categories.
“I didn’t envy the judges,” Murray noted afterward. “Every team brought some fabulous ideas and great presentations.”
Sector-Wide HR Concerns
The Adventure Canada case is, at its core, an HR problem. How do you select and train leaders who are technically exceptional but may struggle with the demands of high-stakes human interaction? How do you build psychological safety into a team operating in an environment with no cell service, no hospital nearby, and no margin for a bad judgment call? And how do you do all of this while honouring the sovereignty and trust of Indigenous communities who have invited you in?
These are not niche expedition-industry concerns. Emotional regulation under pressure, cross-cultural communication, crisis recovery, and the design of scalable training for frontline leaders are challenges that span the tourism sector. Watching a room full of twenty-something students grapple with those questions—proposing frameworks, debating delivery formats, weighing cultural sensitivity against operational urgency—is a valuable indicator of where tourism’s next generation of HR and people professionals is headed.
As Samantha Matienga, one of the event’s lead organizers, put it: “Seeing that growth firsthand is what makes experiences like this so meaningful.”
The 2026 Hospitality and Tourism Case Competition was organized by TMU’s Hospitality and Tourism Students’ Society, with the case developed in collaboration with Kaleigh Collinson of Adventure Canada and Dr. Chris Gibbs of Toronto Metropolitan University. Adventure Canada served as the competition’s industry sponsor.
Related article from UQAM (in French): Une équipe du BGTH triomphe à la compétition Cas GTH 2026 ESG
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