Drown Prize winner has 10-year plan for success

Peter Penev outside Cornell's Statler Hall. He is a finance major in the School of Hotel Administration from Sofia, Bulgaria. Charles Harrington/University Photography

By Linda Myers

In 1999 Peter Penev transferred to Cornell's Hotel School from a two-year program in Vermont, where he enrolled to improve his English after high school in Bulgaria.

"I wanted to attend a prestigious program related to tourism," he said. "I was ecstatic to get accepted."

But although he had a burning desire to succeed, he also had limited financial resources and couldn't cover costs after grants and loans. "My parents had just purchased an apartment in Bulgaria they had been saving for all their lives," he said. They sold it at a loss to help their son pay tuition and expenses.

In addition Penev, aiming to learn as much as possible, took up to 21 credits a semester and worked about 30 hours a week at Cornell's Statler Hotel and Banfi's restaurant to make ends meet.

This spring he was named the winner of the Drown Prize, the highest honor that the Hotel School bestows on a graduating senior. The prize comes with a substantial monetary award that should help pay off some loans. On Sunday, his parents will fly in from Sofia to see him graduate.

Coming here has been "life-changing," said Penev. "The exposure to students, faculty and alumni makes you learn more, go the extra mile, become the person you'd like to be."

He learned finance from Associate Professor Dan Quan and honed his writing skills under senior lecturer in communication Craig Snow. The rigorous course load helped him structure, plan and improve his time management skills.

As treasurer, then president of the collegiate chapter of the Cornell Hotel Society alumni group, he spearheaded social events to unite undergraduate and graduate students and helped organize roundtable discussions with alumni prominent in the hospitality industry. In the process Penev discovered he had the ability to motivate others.

George Bantuvanis, former general manager of the Statler, whose house became a home away from home for Penev, is not surprised. "Peter is a caring, compassionate young man who worries about such things as whether his roommate has a job." Still, Bantuvanis and his wife, Ann, sometime tease Penev for being so driven he forgets to stop and smell the roses.

That may be true, Penev admitted. "My friends laughed when I told them I had a 10-year plan, but it's important for me to be focused."

After graduation Penev, who has accepted a position with Fairmont Hotels and Resorts, hopes to gain experience in real estate development, eventually bringing his skills back to his native country. What he's looking forward to most, however, is returning to Cornell to share his success, just as other graduates have done for him. His parents top the list of people he wants to thank.