Erica Schlegel stood on the east side of Philadelphia’s City Hall on a recent Friday, meeting pedestrians on a triangular brick island and commanding their attention as if performing on a Broadway stage.

“Have an anniversary coming up?” Schlegel said as she approached one person, pirouetting between passersby as she distributed promotional items for a new Center City hotel.

“It’s an amazing deal,” she shouted to another.

Schlegel, a self-described “super senior” in the School of Tourism and Hospitality Management (STHM), was one of three Temple student volunteers that day who promoted the Hotel Palomar Philadelphia by distributing bookmarks with discount offers for the hotel, which is set to open Oct. 15.

In a partnership that is a first for the School of Tourism and Hospitality Management, Temple is assisting with a hotel opening — and is doing so in a number of ways. Two alumni are Hotel Palomar employees, one student is interning at the luxury boutique hotel and at least 30 others are volunteering for marketing efforts that include street outreach three days a week at high-traffic areas such as Reading Terminal Market and 30th Street Station.

In addition, STHM students are serving as “Hotel Ambassadors” by facilitating private showings of the hotel to prospective guests.

Students, such as STHM senior Alina Alter, said the experience is a good way to meet executives and to help fulfill a requirement to log 250 industry-related volunteer hours before graduation.

“They’re so busy with the opening that I wouldn’t expect them to get out here and do this, stand on the street for hours, so it’s nice to be able to help them out with that,” said Alter, who has amassed some 2,000 volunteer hours while at Temple.

For school administrators, the collaboration is another example of STHM’s strong bonds with corporate partners and its reputation as the most comprehensive school of tourism and hospitality management in the greater Philadelphia region.

“In this challenging economic climate, it is unique and rare for a student to be intimately involved in a hotel opening,” said Greg DeShields, STHM’s senior director of corporate relations. “And the fact that a hotel company such as Kimpton has selected Philadelphia as one of the cities in which they are opening a new property is just a priceless experience.”

The partnership with Hotel Palomar and its parent company, Kimpton, includes a visit to Temple from Niki Leondakis, chief operating officer of Kimpton Hotel & Restaurant Group. Leondakis will be on Main Campus on Oct. 14 for a luncheon and an Executive-In-Residence presentation to students.

Hotel Palomar Philadelphia features 230 guestrooms in the restored American Institute of Architects building. The eco-friendly hotel, registered by the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is near Rittenhouse Square at 117 S. 17th St. An adjacent Kimpton restaurant, Square 1682, is also opening in mid-October.

“It is terrific for both the hotel associates and the students to see that if we partner in efforts such as our mass marketing and hotel opening, we are not only helping each other, but we are leading our community by example,” said Bradley Pacana, director of sales and marketing for Hotel Palomar Philadelphia. “This experience gives students a view of the future and gives the associates of the hotel a picture of tomorrow’s leaders.”

Student Emilie Davis said she volunteered for Palomar’s street outreach to get an insider’s view of what goes into promoting and opening a hotel. Clad in a uniform of khaki pants and a Hotel Palomar T-shirt on her second day of volunteering, the STHM freshman said networking drives the industry.

“You just need to know people,” Davis, a freshman, said as she handed out bookmarks in the shadow of City Hall. “That’s why I started early. I just wanted to get my face out there, and my name, so people know who I am — and that I’m serious.”