Dr. Ravi Pandit wants his hospitality students to know he doesn’t have all the answers. “I’m a teacher, not a preacher,” he says. “I believe in dialogue, not in monologue. I’m always learning from my students; not necessarily about the subject, but about life itself.”
His industry experience in the U.S. and overseas and his research experience (he recently won an award for reviewing others’ research) keeps him current in his field, and he stresses its importance.
“It makes you look at problems from different angles,” he says. “You’re not reinventing the wheel; you’re finding new uses for the wheel.”
Pandit encourages his students to connect what they’re learning to what’s happening in the industry today rather than look for answers in textbooks.
“By the time they go into the industry ... there’s no textbook that will tell you what to do,” he says.
Hotel and resort management student Michele Capra reacts well to his classroom approach; she also praised him for helping her land an internship at a hotel in Hilton Head, S.C.
“I really enjoy the way he talks to us as if we’re on the same level as him,” she says. 

Click here to see Dr. Ravi Pandit's Individual Faculty page.