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ta from industry professionals, the same survey instrument developed using a four-step process by Gursoy and Swanger (2004) was used. The four steps included conducting a series of focus groups, developing the survey instrument that accurately measures the industry’s perceived importance of the course subject areas and to examine the gaps amid hospitality curriculum and industry needs, pre-testing the instrument on a sample of industry professionals using an on-line survey method and last but not the least revising and finalizing the instrument based on the pre-test results. Based on the feedback received by Gursoy and Swanger (2004) from their respondents, the survey instrument was modified in 2009. For the purpose of comparison only the common subject areas between the 2004 and 2009 surveys were retained.
Development of the Survey Instrument

The procedures recommended by Churchill (1979) and DeVellis (1991) were followed for developing the survey instrument. Originally, a collection of items consisting of an overall 39 subject matter variables were incorporated from the literature, existing hospitality curriculum, and from five focus groups comprising of the advisory board members, restaurant executives, hotel executives, university alumni, and hospitality educators. Next, the content validity of the identified items was assessed by ten faculty members. The faculty members’ feedback on content and understandability was gathered based on which the items were modified to enhance their clarity, readability, and content validity. Based on the same process any redundancy in the scale items was removed to improve the proposed scale. After the content validity check, it was pre-tested using an on-line survey method involving 50 industry professionals.

The survey instrument was modified one last time based on the pre-test. Each variable was measured via a 5-point Likert scale (5=extremely important, 1= not important at all) with regard to its importance for success in the hospitality industry. The final version of the 2004 survey instrument consisted of four parts - 40 subject matter variables, 128 course content variables, demographic information, and information regarding the performance of the company the respondent was part of. For this study, only the part that deals with the subject areas and demographic information are considered. In 2009 some changes were made based on the feedback received from the participants of Gursoy and Swanger’s 2004 study. While the 2004 survey dealt with 40 subject areas, the 2009 one had only 33. Eleven subject areas were removed from the 2004 survey, while 4 subject matters were added based on the received feedback, in the 2009 survey. The subject areas that were taken out of the 2009 survey instrument are: Fundamentals of Cooking, Math, Accounting, Economics for Decision Making, Tourism, Gaming/Casino Operation, Distribution Channels, Secondary Revenue Management, Beverage Management, Destination Management, and Dining Room Service Management. The subject areas that were added to the 2009 study are: International Tourism, Public Relations, Convention and Meeting Planning, and Food and Beverage Management. For the comparison, the 29 common areas between the 2009 and 2004 surveys were considered.
Data Collection

A self-administered survey questionnaire was mailed to the targeted sample of industry professionals. An individually signed cover letter co