Videos

In this week’s Leadership Live, Scott Humphrey shares a lesson in leadership from the life of hotel icon Harris Rosen...

Harris Rosen has been a key player and innovator in the hotel industry for decades. But he's also a social innovator. Twenty years ago, he began the Tangelo Park Project. Rosen "adopted" a Florida neighborhood struggling with drugs and crime. He set up pre-school centers throughout the neighborhood using residents who were trained and equipped for early childhood education. Every child attends for free. And every child who graduates from high school and is accepted by a college or vocational school has their tuition paid 100%. The results have been dramatic. High school graduation rates, which had been below 50%, have been near 100% for years. And college graduation rates are approaching 80%. Crime is down 65%. So why is no one using this idea elsewhere?

Over 20 years, Harris Rosen, a self-made philanthropist paid for daycare for all parents and paid state college full tuition for every high school gradate in the devastated neighborhood of Tangelo park. The result?

Crime was cut in half, the high school graduation rate went from 25% to almost 100% and property values quadrupled.

Harris Rosen, President & COO of Rosen Hotels & Resorts, on giving back to the community and working hard to achieve any goal.

See how businessman and hotelier Harris Rosen is turning around a Central Florida community with an investment in education.

Harris Rosen Honoring HMREC
Harris Rosen was born and raised in a low-income area of lower east side Manhattan. His parents instilled in him at a young age that they don’t have to live in that way and that education would get him there. As a young man, he served in the army for a few years and attended college where he earned a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in Hotel Administration. He purchased his first hotel in 1974, using all of his savings for a down payment on a 256-room Quality Inn. He now owns multiple popular hotels and resorts in the heart of Orlando’s tourism district, including the Rosen Centre, a popular meeting and convention hotel right on International Drive.

As impressive as his work history is, his philanthropic heart is what sets this hotel mogul above the rest. In the early 1990’s, Mr. Rosen had his epiphany, a voice encouraging him to give back for all that he had received in life. In addition to the successful hospitality school he donated to the University of Central Florida, he then decided to start a program in the low-income Tangelo Park area to encourage the value that got him to where he is today: education.

By offering free preschool, parenting classes, and post high school programs including vocational and technical training as well as paying for the students’ college, he has helped the area grow prosperous. Not only has the crime rate in the area dropped by 60%, but the elementary is now a grade-A school and the high school graduation rate is up to near 100%. Harris Rosen also believes that education needs encouragement beyond the walls of a school. His participation in the support of the Holocaust Center of Florida shows just that. “There should be a holocaust facility in every community in the United States. A gentle reminder that horrible things happened and are capable of happening again.” -Harris Rosen

Harris Rosen and several general managers for Rosen Hotels speak to the importance of the Rosen culture, philosophy and mission that comprise the Rosen difference.

Rosen Centre Sizzle Video

Rosen Centre's new Executive Pastry Chef Alon Gontowski showcasing Rosen Centre's delish desserts that they will be serving at the Cattle Baron's Ball this Saturday at Shingle Creek.

Rosen Centre's Chef Alon on Fox 35 promoting Cattle Barons Ball