SCHOOL NEWS

PARKS BECOMES NEW DIRECTOR FOR SCHOOL OF HRRM

Steve Infanti

Dr. Sara C. Parks has been named director of the School of Hotel, Restaurant, and Recreation Management in the college. She will assume her new responsibilities in the School on July 1, 2000.

Parks holds a faculty appointment in the School of Hotel, Restaurant, and Recreation Management with over 25 years of experience offering technology-based degrees and training programs.

Parks, a national leader in dietetics, is a past president of the American Dietetic Association (ADA), where she represented over 70,000 food and nutrition experts around the world. She has also served as president of the American Dietetic Association Foundation, a private foundation whose mission is to promote nutrition research to the public.

A Penn State faculty member since 1971, Parks teaches undergraduate and graduate courses focusing on marketing and strategic planning within the hotel, restaurant, and dietetic fields. Her research interests include impacts of environmental trends on consumer satisfaction and the effectiveness of distance education.

During her career, she was honored with University-wide awards for outstanding teaching and for administrative excellence in distance and continuing education, and the College of Health and Human Development's Evelyn R. Saubel Award for outstanding advising and service to students. She has received the Huddleson Award for Outstanding Publication by the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, and the Pennsylvania Dietetic Association named her Outstanding Dietitian of the Year in 1995.

PSHRS NAMES HOSPITALITY EXECUTIVE OF THE YEAR

Steve Infanti

Harrison A. (Skip) Hartman, Jr., '58 HA, vice president and managing director for Loews L'Enfant Plaza Hotel in Washington, D.C. and regional vice president of Loews Hotels, received the 1999 Hospitality Executive of the Year Award from the Penn State Hotel and Restaurant Society (PSHRS).

The award was presented during a special dinner honoring Hartman by Preston Robert Tisch, Co-Chairman of the Board of Loews Corporation, the parent company of Loews Hotels; Diane Ryan, Executive Director of Penn State's Alumni Association; and PSHRS President James Purdum.