Our class had students from Business Operations Management, Accountancy,

and Hotel and Restaurant Management. Although we would have rather minded our own
business in class, it could not be that way for long as we were grouped with each other
at some point and that’s when we noticed our differences with each other. It was a shock
to discover just how different our department/college cultures could be despite coming
from the same campus.
One difference I got was that with regards to academics, the students from CTHM
were generally chiller than us. A lot of students, even from the BOM program, were
frequently absent even after being told that attendance and answering assessments is all
they needed to pass. They seemed to be at ease despite having missed or failed an
assessment and were in no rush to submit due papers and assessments. As mentioned,
though, this may be because they are trained more on practical assessments instead of
pen and paper exams. Compared to us, it’s safe to say they are more skilled when it
comes to how to go about their job than us. They are more into improving their skills rather
than being book smart which is understandable.
Another difference I noticed was that they have a slightly more informal way of
organizing events than we do. They were not too concerned with budgets and choosing
the cheaper alternative, rather they just pool whatever money in and spend for whatever
they need, and then give back what is left. We found this most confusing because it
clashed with what we were taught in class and in our college. We were uncomfortable
with how they spent the money immediately instead of making a budget with the finance
committee to control spending and force them to save a little more than usual.
These differences created a few rifts between our groups, even though we didn’t
voice our thoughts out to them. During the sem, there were a lot of moments where we
thought they were just lazy and relying on our need for the grades to pull them with us.
Because of this, we decided to step back and let them lead the next project to force them
to work. This may have further justified our pre-conceived idea of students from their
college which hindered us from fully cooperating with their ideas. But after learning about
cultures, we realize that we’re all just different from each other and that’s not necessarily
a bad thing. They may not study much about the theoretical aspect of things, but they
probably excel in the skills part of their career which is different from our culture.