If you have been comparing BS Tourism Management against BS Hotel and Restaurant Management, you are comparing a current degree against a discontinued one. That is not a technicality — it changes what you should be reading and what you should be asking schools.
Here is what happened. CMO No. 30, series of 2006 was CHED's policy document for four related degrees at once: BS Tourism Management, BS Hospitality Management, BS Hotel and Restaurant Management and BS Travel Management. In 2017 the Commission replaced that framework with CMO No. 62, series of 2017, whose subject line names only two programmes: Policies, Standards and Guidelines for Bachelor of Science in Tourism Management (BSTM) and Bachelor of Science in Hospitality Management (BSHM). Section 5.1 of that order states, in as many words, that the degree programmes described in it "shall be called" BSTM and BSHM. Its minimum curricular requirements were implemented starting Academic Year 2018-2019.
Hotel and Restaurant Management was not banned. It was absorbed. The hotel and restaurant content is now the professional core of BS Hospitality Management.
So the real comparison, for anyone enrolling now, is BSTM against BSHM. This post covers what CHED actually prescribes for each, where the two diverge, why neither leads to a PRC licence, and what to do about the schools still using the old name.
What the two programmes share
Because both live inside the same memorandum order, most of the curriculum is identical.
| Component | Units | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| General Education | 36 | Subjects per CMO No. 20, s. 2013 |
| National Service Training Program | 6 | |
| Physical Education | 8 | |
| Subtotal | 50 | |
| Tourism and Hospitality Core | 30 | Shared by both programmes |
| Professional Courses | 30 | This is where BSTM and BSHM diverge |
| Professional Elective Courses | 15 | Sample lists provided; schools may offer electives not on the list |
| Practicum | 6 | Minimum 600 hours, identical for both |
| Total for the ABM track | 137 units | Minimum |
| Total for schools eligible to offer a specialisation | 152 units | Only for qualified higher education institutions |
Two details in that table are easy to skate past.
The 137 is a minimum. CMO 62 states that higher education institutions are free to design curricula suited to their own contexts and missions, provided they can demonstrate the same minimum outcomes are attained. A 150-unit BSHM at one school and a 137-unit BSHM at another are both compliant.
The ABM assumption. The curriculum is vertically aligned with the Accountancy, Business and Management strand of senior high school. For students who came from a different strand, CMO 62 requires the school to offer five ABM courses — Fundamentals of Accounting, Business and Management; Organization and Management; Business Marketing; Business Finance; and Applied Economics, three units each. If you took HUMSS or STEM, ask your target school how it handles that, because it is fifteen units of catch-up somebody has to schedule. Our Home Economics strand guide covers the other common feeder strand into these programmes.
Where they actually diverge
The 30-unit professional block is the decision. Everything else is shared.
BS Tourism Management professional courses in CMO 62 include Global Culture and Tourism Geography, Sustainable Tourism, Tour and Travel Management, Transportation Management, Tourism Policy Planning and Development, Research in Tourism, a conferences and events management course covering MICE, and two Foreign Language subjects that CHED requires to be in the same language across both terms.
BS Hospitality Management professional courses include Kitchen Essentials and Basic Food Preparation, Fundamentals in Food Service Operations, Fundamentals in Lodging Operations, an introduction to MICE, and the same two-term Foreign Language requirement.
Read those two lists side by side and the split is obvious. BSTM is planning, movement and destinations — how people get somewhere, why they go, and how a place manages being visited. BSHM is premises and service — kitchens, dining rooms, front desks and floors.
The 15 units of professional electives amplify the difference. CHED publishes long suggested lists for each and explicitly allows schools to offer electives that are not on the list, selected on the basis of regional needs, industry demand or the school's own capability. The BSTM list runs to things like Medical and Wellness Tourism, Cruise Tourism, Ecotourism Management, Heritage Tourism and Destination Management and Marketing. The BSHM list runs to Garde Manger, Bread and Pastry, Asian Cuisine, Halal Cookery, Front Office Operation, Housekeeping Operations and Revenue Management.
This is why two graduates holding the same degree from different schools can have visibly different skill sets, and why comparing specific schools' elective offerings is more useful than comparing the degree names.
For the detailed curriculum walkthroughs, we have separate guides to BS Tourism Management and to BS Hospitality Management, plus a curriculum-level tourism versus hospitality comparison.
The practicum is the same for both
CMO 62 sets a minimum of 600 hours, worth 6 units, for BSTM and BSHM alike, and defines one practicum unit as at least 100 hours per term. The units may be split into two subject offerings, assigned to different semesters, different areas or different levels of operation.
CHED strongly encourages that the venue be accredited by the Department of Tourism, for local and international placements alike.
CHED returned to this in CMO No. 18, series of 2021, its guidelines on the conduct of practicum activities for BSTM and BSHM during the pandemic. That order restates the 600-hour minimum as "based on the curricula as defined in CMO No. 62, series of 2017" and lists the areas a practicum may cover: food production, front office, food and beverage service, housekeeping, travel services, tour operations, government agencies in tourism and hospitality, MICE, and other relevant areas based on the specialisation received in school.
Where the two programmes differ in practice is placement. Tourism students tend towards travel agencies, tour operators, airlines and local tourism offices. Hospitality students tend towards hotels, restaurants and accommodation providers. CMO 18 is explicit that for Hospitality and Hotel and Restaurant Management, restricted face-to-face activity was to happen only within CHED-authorised institutions and Department of Tourism accredited hotels and accommodations.
Neither degree leads to a PRC licence
This is the question most families are really asking, so it deserves a direct answer.
Neither BS Tourism Management nor BS Hospitality Management is a board programme. CMO No. 62, s. 2017 does not direct graduates towards a Professional Regulation Commission licensure examination, because there is no professional regulatory board for tourism or hospitality management the way there is for accountancy, nursing or engineering.
What the order points at instead is worth knowing, because it is the closest thing to a credential ladder these degrees have:
- The ASEAN Mutual Recognition Arrangement for Tourism Professionals, signed in November 2012, which allows ASEAN member states to mutually recognise aspects of one another's conformity with assessment results for tourism professionals, through the Common ASEAN Tourism Curriculum. CMO 62 says the curriculum was written with this in mind.
- Assessment and certification given by the Tourism Professional Certification Board, which CMO 62 says may form part of a student's portfolio.
- TESDA qualifications through ladderised education. CMO 62 encourages schools to follow the Ladderized Education Program under RA 10647, the Ladderized Education Act of 2014, creating an interface between technical-vocational qualifications and the collegiate curriculum.
In plain terms: your career progression in these fields runs on industry certifications, TESDA competency assessments and regional recognition, not on a Philippine licence. That is a genuine structural difference from a board course, and it cuts both ways — there is no exam standing between you and employment, and there is also no licence protecting your title.
What to do about schools still advertising "BS HRM"
Some schools kept the HRM name. Some job ads still ask for it. CHED itself used the paired phrasing "Hospitality/Hotel and Restaurant Management" in its 2021 practicum guidelines, and CMO 62's own faculty qualification rules accept an undergraduate degree in Hotel and Restaurant Management as a qualifying credential for programme chairs and faculty — which tells you how many people in the sector hold that older degree.
None of that means a programme advertised as BS HRM is invalid. It means you should ask three questions of the school rather than of the brochure:
- What degree title appears on the transcript and diploma? That is the thing employers and foreign credential evaluators read.
- Which CHED memorandum order does the curriculum comply with? For anything enrolled after AY 2018-2019, the answer should be CMO No. 62, s. 2017.
- Does the programme hold the necessary authority? CMO 62 requires private institutions to secure proper authority from the Commission, and requires state and local universities to adhere to the standards in securing a Certificate of Program Compliance.
If a school cannot answer the second question, that is more informative than anything on its website.
Choosing between them
Strip away the naming history and the decision is fairly clean.
Choose BS Tourism Management if you are drawn to planning, geography, policy, transport, destination marketing and events, and you can see yourself in a travel agency, tour operation, airline, tourism office or events company. The foreign language requirement and the research subject signal a programme that expects analysis as much as service.
Choose BS Hospitality Management if you want the kitchen, the dining room, the front desk and the floor, and you are willing to spend real hours in laboratory subjects. The elective lists tell the truth here — a programme where Butchery, Garde Manger and Bread and Pastry are on the menu is a programme with a lot of standing up.
Two practical notes on top. First, check the school's elective list before you enrol, because CHED lets schools deviate from the suggested lists entirely, and that is where specialisation actually lives. Second, check where the school places its practicum students, because 600 hours in a Department of Tourism accredited hotel and 600 hours somewhere convenient are not the same year of your life.
For a broader view of the older HRM-branded content still circulating, our BS Hotel and Restaurant Management guide covers what schools using that label typically teach.
Sources
- CHED Memorandum Order No. 62, series of 2017, Policies, Standards and Guidelines for Bachelor of Science in Tourism Management (BSTM) and Bachelor of Science in Hospitality Management (BSHM) (official PDF) — https://legacy.ched.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/CMO-62-BS-Hospitality-Tourism-Management.pdf
- CHED Memorandum Order No. 18, series of 2021, Guidelines on the Conduct of Practicum Activities for BSTM and BSHM (official PDF) — https://legacy.ched.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/CMO-NO.-18-S.-2021.pdf
- Commission on Higher Education, 2006 CHED Memorandum Orders index, listing CMO No. 30, s. 2006 covering BSTM, BSHM, BSHRM and BSTrM — https://legacy.ched.gov.ph/2006-ched-memorandum-orders/
- Commission on Higher Education, 2017 CHED Memorandum Orders index — https://legacy.ched.gov.ph/2017-ched-memorandum-orders/
