Neil A. Carousso produces NewsNation original “Kurt’s Country” – a celebration of country music and a slice of Americana with host Kurt Bardella.
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New Scholarship Assists NY Students with Dream Internship on Capitol Hill
By Neil A. Carousso
NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — New York college students can apply for the opportunity to work in Congress next semester.
A new scholarship will be awarded to State University of New York (SUNY) students who need financial support to intern in Washington. It is offered by the Former Administrative Assistant of the Year Award (affectionally called FAATY) in partnership with SUNY and the New York State Society.
2021 FAATY honoree Kevin Fogarty, former chief of staff to retired Rep. Peter King (R-NY) and co-founder of Ambrose Partners, told WCBS 880’s Neil A. Carousso the interns will have the opportunity to learn from veteran Capitol Hill staffers.
“This really gives these individuals an opportunity to see things that they normally would not do or be able to see,” Fogarty said. “It also allows them to create relationships not only with this office, but with other offices, and also with former chiefs of staff, too, who can help mentor these students and try to point them in the right direction for something they’re interested in.”
Interns will be assigned to an office of a member in the New York Congressional Delegation.
Fogarty invites SUNY students who are interested in learning more about the internship to contact him directly via Ambrose Partners’ website.
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Decision Makers Exclusive: Marriott President Says ‘Bleisure’ is the Future of Travel
In Best Of, Featured, Guest, Interview, Latest, News Stories, Technology, The World, Top News, videosProduced by Neil A. Carousso
NEW YORK (Bloomberg/1010 WINS) — While travel lovers may still have the COVID-19 pandemic blues, one hospitality industry leader recently joined 1010 WINS and Bloomberg to explain why the future of travel looks bright as we head into 2022.
Marriott International President Stephanie Linnartz told hosts Carol Massar and Larry Mullins in an exclusive Bloomberg/1010 WINS Decision Makers interview that “Bleisure,” or mixing business and leisure travel, is poised to be the future of the industry.
“I’m more bullish about the future of travel and my company than I’ve ever been,” she said.
Near the start of the pandemic in April 2020, Marriott – a hospitality company that operated 2,149 properties as of the end of last year, including JW Marriott, The Ritz-Carlton, St. Regis and W Hotels – saw business drop by 90 percent. Lockdowns and travel restrictions severely curtailed travel around the globe.
Since most of the company’s employees work on-site, around 80 percent were furloughed, laid off or lost their jobs when the pandemic hit and 25 percent of Marriott’s hotels were closed.
“It was really the most unprecedented, devastating event to ever hit our industry and other related industries,” said Linnartz, who has been with the company for 24 years.
However, she said the company worked quickly and creatively to adapt. When travel was restricted, this often meant entering the Marriott Bonvoy brand into partnerships with companies such as UberEats.
Now that travel has opened up more, Linnartz said she can see people eager to hit the road more than ever.
“We have really entered into a phase of recovery in the travel business,” Linnartz told WINS and Bloomberg. “I really think that travel is part of the human condition,” she added.
With the pandemic, the hotel experience has also changed, Linnartz said. Heightened cleanliness procedures and more features, such as check ins and room service, are offered via mobile devices.
“That’s something I think that’s going to stick,” said Linnartz of the technological advances spurred by COVID-19. Yet, she said it won’t replace the “human element” necessary to make travel great.
Going forward, the company is also planning to focus on some initiatives launched before the pandemic: becoming more environmentally friendly as well as offering high-end rental properties and yachts.
In 2019, Marriott International announced it would replace single-use toiletry bottles of shampoo, conditioner and bath gel in guestroom showers with larger, pump-topped bottles to reduce landfill waste. As of that August, the larger bottles were already in use at around 1,000 North American properties.
Another project from 2019 is the Marriott rental property program. Unlike other similar services offered by companies like Airbnb, Marriot properties are only premium or luxury, with high standards for amenities. Since the program started, offerings have grown from 2,000 properties to around 50,000.
“Things are moving in the right direction,” she said. “Travel is coming back in a major way.”
A remaining challenge for the industry has been finding staff amid a labor shortage, but Linnartz said Marriot’s commitment to a solid work culture and offering opportunities for advancement has helped prevent high turnover.
“Our culture at Marriott has always been our secret sauce,” she said.
“When you had a job at a place like that, you know, you were big stuff in the neighborhood you had a pride in doing that,” said Mullins, reminiscing about his time as a Marriott employee in Orlando, Fla.
As Marriott continues to look for ways to make work experiences for its associates positive and shaped to today’s challenges, Linnartz can also see how new, flexible work schedules in other industries are impacting the travel business.
“Bleisure,” is growing because people can work remote and take longer vacations, she explained.
Another challenge for the travel industry is the recent surge in omicron variant COVID-19 cases, which has set off mask mandates in the U.S. as well as some international travel restrictions.
Now that Marriott has weathered one part of the pandemic storm, Linnartz has high hopes for the future.
“From crisis comes creativity,” she said.
Decision Makers is a joint production from Bloomberg and Audacy – the parent company of 1010 WINS. It is produced by Neil A. Carousso.
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Nets Winning Despite COVID-19 Outbreak
Executive produced by Carousso Enterprises, LLC
BROOKLYN, NY — NY2C’s On The Call visits Barclays Center this week as the Brooklyn Nets played host to the Philadelphia 76ers amid the team’s COVID-19 outbreak.
Hosts Derek Futterman and Joey Rinaldi spoke with fans outside the arena who are hopeful the Nets can bring a title to Brooklyn this season.
NY2C’s On The Call podcast is executive produced by Carousso Enterprises, LLC. Consult your doctor on questions about COVID-19 and the approved vaccines and seek out information from credible sources, including the CDC and FDA.
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With COVID cases soaring to pandemic highs, remote work solidifies as new normal
Produced by Neil A. Carousso
NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — People may be done with COVID, but COVID isn’t done with us just yet.
New restrictions and mandates aim to quell accelerating Omicron and Delta variant infections as COVID-19 cases in New York and other parts of the country reach its highest level in the entire pandemic.
Several companies this week decided to send their employees home for the holidays and delay their return to the office plans indefinitely, making remote work a two-year reality for many.
WCBS anchor Lynda Lopez covers these stories plus pandemic fatigue across both sides of the aisle on The 880 Weekly Rewind, produced by Neil A. Carousso.
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Long Island High School Prepares Students for Life and Business through Personal Finance Course
By Joe Connolly and Neil A. Carousso
MINEOLA, NY (WCBS 880) — A private high school on Long Island is teaching financial responsibility – a real-world skill people often learn on their own.
Chaminade High School in Mineola requires a two-year financial literacy course for juniors and seniors. The class aims to prevent students from forming bad habits at a young age.
“I think for many of us, we learned how money works just by making the mistakes along the way and making those first decisions on our own,” said Chaminade president Brother Thomas Cleary who implemented the curriculum after Bloomberg proposed the idea in 2014. The financial firm sponsors the course and the school’s business center.
“We really want to empower our young men here to have the knowledge of how their money works before they actually have to press that button and put it into action,” he said.
A number of business leaders, including Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, have said they wish they had been able to take a finance class in high school. Bro. Thomas told WCBS 880 he would connect anyone interested in starting a financial literacy course at their school with Chaminade’s representative at Bloomberg.
Joe Connolly and Neil A. Carousso look at how sound financial principles apply to running a business on the WCBS Small Business Spotlight, sponsored by Dime Community Bank. Entrepreneurship can lead people down a path to financial freedom, but operating a business well requires financial discipline, as Chaminade’s class addresses.
“We have a number of young men, who are still in college, who’ve started their own businesses and have said that this financial literacy course really helped them navigate the ups and downs of starting a business while a college-aged student,” Bro. Thomas said. “We’re seeing in real-time the benefits of this course, and I think over the long-term, the benefits of our young men going into the business world with a solid understanding of how money works and how to make it work better for themselves and for our society is a win-win for everybody.”
The class focuses on saving for retirement, investing and avoiding credit card debt. Students at the all-boys Catholic high school also learn about the benefits of different types of investment accounts, including Roth IRAs and 401(k)s, and partake in a stock market competition in which the teens begin with a faux balance of $1 million to purchase stocks.
“You walk in the hallway, you’ll see kids checking on their iPad what their investment is doing that day and where it’s going,” the school president said of the enthusiasm he has witnessed first-hand. “These are 17, 18 year old kids who are really interested and that’s how the teachers keep them really interested in the course.”
The students monitor their portfolios through the semester with a close eye on movements in the market in real-time. The course’s instructors are experienced Wall Street professionals who bring their real-world experience into the classroom to relate how macro decisions affect people on a personal level.
“You know, where the market goes, it affects not only interest rates but how that affects mortgage loans and credit card debt and just the economy globally,” noted Bro. Thomas. “I’ve seen the instructors take one really minute detail in the news that day – you know, why did the stock go up or down – and they just show the ripple affect across the globe in so many different sectors.”
He told Connolly and Carousso that Chaminade’s objective is to provide a financial toolkit and a foundation students can build upon in their professional careers and personal lives.
“I got one email recently saying that his course at Chaminade was probably one of the most influential courses he had in terms of helping him decide what he wanted to study and where his passion was,” Bro. Thomas said.
See ideas on how to teach your kids about financial responsibility and get book recommendations for the holidays to make learning fun and engaging on the Small Business Spotlight video above.
