When the School of Hospitality Management was courting Donna Quadri-Felitti to be its next Marvin Ashner Endowed Director, one perk mentioned was that the school has the second-oldest active alumni society at the university. For an industry that thrives on partnerships, networking, and reputation, this was a big draw.

“The power of the connection and the brand extension is exceptional,” says Quadri-Felitti, who has been at Penn State for nine years and works closely with alumni in the Penn State Hotel & Restaurant Society, an affiliate program group of the Alumni Association and the College of Health and Human Development Alumni Society. PSHRS was founded in 1942—just a few years after the degree program began in 1937—when a group of its very first alumni banded together to create the Pennsylvania Hotel Greeters.

Today, the society’s 23-member executive board represents the 9,000 living alumni from the School of Hospitality Management, helping current students and alumni learn, network, and advance in their careers. One of its signature programs is the Alumni in the Classroom initiative, a partnership with the school that brings about 120 alumni back to campus each October to spend a week teaching current students via guest lectures, Q&A panels, lunchtime roundtables, breakout groups, and lots of networking.

“It’s wonderful,” says society president Tom Neely ’87 H&HD of what he calls a “supernetwork” between alumni and students in the program. “That engagement with students is one of the best things our alumni do.” Neely, former general manager of the Nittany Lion Inn, was named Alumni of the Year by the society in 2020, one of a handful of awards given out during the annual Alumni in the Classroom week.

The Hospitality Executive of the Year award is the group’s primary fundraising vehicle. The society seeks donations in the executive’s honor; last year alone, it raised nearly $600,000, and overall the society has endowed nearly $2 million for scholarships, faculty support, and funding for students’ conference travel and other “co-curricular experiences.”

“The alumni … have been the backbone of our crowdfunding campaign,” Quadri-Felitti says of the society’s support. “Our young alumni know that a measure of success is giving back; that’s part of the Penn State ethos.”