For the first time in its seven-year history, The Fox School’s Musser Award for Excellence in Leadership, the school’s most prestigious award, was presented to a Temple alumni – Dennis Alter, Chairman and CEO of Advanta.

“Dennis Alter is a true Renaissance man,” says M. Moshe Porat, dean of The Fox School of Business and Management at Temple University. “He is a role model for all executives to emulate. He has taken a small business established by his father and created a multi-billion dollar financial service company. In addition to his phenomenal business success, he is an extraordinary humanitarian who has never forgotten his roots and tirelessly gives his intellect, time, energy and treasury to our community.”

The Musser Award promotes the ethic that exceptional achievement in business and exceptional effort on behalf of the community are compatible, mutually supportive goals. Alter was chosen for the award because of his outstanding business success and his numerous charitable works on behalf of The Fox School and organizations such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Opera Company of Philadelphia, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the National Museum of American Jewish History.

Alter’s father, Jack, founded the company in 1951 as the Teachers Service Organization to provide loans to teachers, a group typically overlooked by traditional banks at the time. Alter joined the company in 1969 and was named chairman in 1972. Today, Advanta is one of the nation’s largest, most successful providers of credit cards and services to small businesses. In 2000, Fortune named the company one of the “Most Admired Companies in America,” and in 1994, Alter was featured on the cover of Business Philadelphia for its feature story on “Best Bosses.”

A 1966 Temple graduate and strong financial supporter of The Fox School through the Advanta Foundation and his personal charitable endeavors, Alter joins a distinguished list of previous Musser Award recipients. The award is named in honor of its first recipient, Warren V. (Pete) Musser, founder of Safeguard Scientifics and president of The Musser Group, who later endowed the award in 1998. Past recipients also include Sidney Kimmel, founder and former chairman of Jones Apparel Group; Willard G. Rouse III, former chairman, CEO and president of Liberty Property Trust; William Avery, retired chairman and CEO of Crown Cork and Seal Company; Dr. Felix Zandman, chairman and CEO of Vishay Intertechnology, Inc.; and John C. Bogle, founder and former chairman of The Vanguard Group.

The award was presented at a gala on November 11 attended by over 450 representatives of Temple University and the Greater Philadelphia business and philanthropic communities. In addition to honoring Alter, the dinner also recognizes achievement by members of the Fox School community in teaching, faculty service, administrative service, student leadership and alumni leadership.

Proceeds from the dinner support the Dean’s Fund for Excellence. The fund aids programs that add significant value to the learning experience at The Fox School, among them the Dean’s Undergraduate Research Scholars Program.