Elevating Instruction Through Industry: The HET Microcredential Experience

Delaware’s Hospitality, Events, & Tourism (HET) Microcredential is redefining what high-quality professional learning looks like for Career & Technical Education educators. Through a strategic partnership between the Delaware Department of Education and the Delaware Restaurant Foundation, the program provides industry-aligned credentials designed to deepen technical expertise while strengthening equity-driven, high-impact rigorous instruction.

At its core, the microcredential is built around instructional transformation. Educators participate in structured Professional Learning Communities, immersive experiences, and asynchronous coursework aligned to real industry demands. Each session requires teachers to produce classroom-ready artifacts, ensuring that every learning experience directly translates into improved student outcomes. This portfolio-based approach culminates in a microcredential (45 clock hours each) and recognition as an HET Educator Leader.

Instruction throughout the cohort is intentionally co-designed and facilitated by Meg Gardner of the Delaware Restaurant Foundation and Dr. Michael Hill-Shaner of the Delaware Department of Education. Their collaboration bridges industry practice with CTE instructional strategy, modeling how to embed academic readiness, sustainability, student centered and culturally competence experiences and resources, social-emotional learning, leadership development, and authentic work-based learning into daily classroom instruction. The result is a professional learning model that strengthens technical content knowledge, academic integration, and pedagogical precision.

The immersive Work-Based Learning experience, sponsored by Bally's Dover Casino Resort, brought this instructional model full circle. Educators toured commercial kitchens, engaged directly with culinary teams across multiple restaurant concepts, explored hotel operations alongside lodging management leaders, and examined workforce pipelines in action. The day concluded with a sponsored lunch from Macau Kitchen, reinforcing culinary branding, guest experience excellence, and operational sophistication, and providing educators with powerful, real-world insight to bring back to their students and programs.