Hotelier educates kids then sends them to college.

by Jessie States | November 11, 2011 | (1)

It was 1993 when Harris Rosen approached the Tangelo Park neighborhood association with his request that every 2, 3 and 4 year old in the community attend preschool and every high school grad go to college…on him. And he wanted association approval to move forward. Immediately.

Neighborhood leaders agreed: Rosen would start with the 2 year olds, they assumed. In 16 years, as teens, they’d get free rides to college.

But Rosen had other ideas—and college aims for the Class of ’93. Since that year, he’s sent more than 350 neighborhood teens to higher ed. on full scholarships—no future necklaces, rings or first-borns attached. It was his way to give back to a community less than a mile from the International Drive tourist strip.

Harris recalls his own childhood growing up between the East River and the Bowery in NYC, a place where “education wasn’t really terribly important.” 

“My parents told me and my brother that education was really the only way out. We were the first in our family to go to college. I knew that if ever I was going to give back, I was going to give back in the form of education.”

Rosen is no stranger to philanthropy. A decade ago, he donated a 20-acre site and US$10 million to the University of Central Florida for the Rosen College of Hospitality Management. The college opened in January 2004 with 75 students. Enrollment jumped to 2,500 in just three years. And Rosen finances a $2 million standing scholarship endowment at the school.

Tangelo Park's early childhood program, affectionately called the Two-Year-Old Program, remains the catalyst to higher education. Rosen supports 10 preschools in Tangelo Park, each housed in a neighborhood home. Rosen paid to have each house outfitted and expanded to accommodate an early learning environment. He pays the teachers and finances their training. 

Since 1996, the program has educated more than 400 tots, developing their fine and gross motor skills and cognitive and social skills, enabling them to transition into pre-K and kindergarten already reading, writing and answering simple math equations. (The University of Central Florida has provided computers with printers and software to each childcare center.)

The success of the program is easy to measure. In the early 1990s, the neighborhood suffered from socioeconomic demographic problems: drug use, poor school attendance, declining test scores and high dropout rates. Today, crime in the neighborhood is down 48 percent. And since 1993, Tangelo Park Elementary student’s reading, writing and math scores have steadily increased. For the last six years, the school has rated “high performing” in the Florida A+ Plan and satisfied 100 percent of the criteria required by the Federal No Child Left Behind Act. 

Tangelo High School boasts a 100 percent graduation rate, and the college acceptance rate is 75 percent. Since the program’s inception, 190 students have accepted a Rosen college scholarship and earned college and university degrees and vocational/technical certificates. Other students are now earning full college scholarships from other sources, and use the Rosen Foundation scholarship is a safety net.

And we’re not just talking tuition. The Rosen scholarships cover room, board and living expenses too for every Tangelo Park high school graduate accepted by a vocational school, community college or public university in the state of Florida.

But Rosen has once again his sights beyond expectations. He has been working to convince U.S.-based corporations and their owners to begin similar programs in communities across the U.S. He has had preliminary discussions with the Gates Foundation.

“The program gives these youngsters so much hope, so much hope that they work hard in school, they do well in school and they go on to college,” he says. “My dream has been over the years to continue this program and hope that other people replicate it throughout the U.S. It hasn’t happened yet. But I’m hopeful.”

Imagine what our industry alone could accomplish. One+

About Harris Rosen

After earning a degree in 1961 from the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell University, Harris Rosen served for three years in the U.S. Army as an officer in Germany and South Korea, before completing the Advanced Management course at the University of Virginia Graduate School of Business on a Hilton Corp. Scholarship.

He began his career at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City as a file clerk, continuing with Hilton Hotels in various management positions in Pittsburgh, Buffalo and Dallas. Rosen then joined the Post Company of Dallas as director of hotel operations, followed by a stint as the Disney Co. in California as director of hotel planning. In 1974, Rosen left Disney and purchased the 256-room bankrupt Quality Inn on International Drive in Orlando.

The oil embargo was at its height, and many Orlando hotels were bankrupt or closed; Rosen spent his entire $20,000 life savings and hitchhiked to the U.S. Northeast to meet with motor coach companies. Once there, he met prospective clients in bars and pubs, negotiating contracts on cocktail napkins. Often, his new clients felt so sorry for him, having no money and no transportation, they would drive him to their competitors for his next appointment. 

Today, with 728 rooms it is the second largest Quality Inn in the chain. Along the way, Rosen acquired the Rodeway Inn International with 315 rooms and subsequently purchased 14 acres on International Drive to build the Quality Inn Plaza, which at 1,020 rooms is the largest U.S. Quality Inn in the nation. In 1987, Rosen completed the first phase of his 640-room Comfort Inn at Lake Buena Vista, and later added 320 rooms. The 800-room Rosen Plaza opened its doors in 1991 as the first convention hotel within the Rosen Hotels & Resorts family, followed by the 1,334-room Rosen Centre Hotel, which is also contiguous to the Orange County Convention Center. 

That same year, Rosen decided to self-insure his employees, cut his company’s healthcare costs and better care for his then 1,500 (now 4,500) employees with superior service and care. The company saves $8 for every $1 it puts into the medical center, and, its worker compensation costs are half the industry average. 

In 2001, Rosen acquired 250 acres and developed his newest property, the 1,500-room Rosen Shingle Creek luxury hotel, which opened in September 2006. 

In the meantime, Rosen has devoted his time and money to his many philanthropic endeavors, which include the Tangelo Park programs.

Jessie States

Jessie States, senior editor, meeting industry for MPI, edits and manages research, white papers and case studies investigating everything from the future of events and the business value of meetings to technology and CSR. She also edits columns for MPI magazine One+ and has won several writing awards from the likes of the American Society of Business Publication Editors and APEX.

TAGS: meeting industry , Harris Rosen , hotels , One+ November 2011 , Orlando