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CAL POLY BOUND!

RPTA HIRES KEVIN LIN TO FILL VACANT SPECIAL EVENTS POSITION

By Anna Bach  (RPTA '17), Staff Writer

His hometown is the birthplace of influential Chinese philosophers and emperors such as Xunzi and Emperor Qin; he has interned for a gold trading company in Hong Kong; he served as a tour guide for a short time in Beijing; he served as a tour guide in Beijing; he once went an entire week eating nothing but Subway subs; and he is coming to San Luis Obispo in Fall 2014 as a newly hired RPTA professor. Introducing...Kevin Lin!

We are excited to welcome Lin to the RPTA faculty. His extensive experience in the meeting, incentive, conference, and exhibition (MICE) industry makes him a perfect fit to teach classes in the event planning & management concentration of our department

Lin grew up in Handan, China, and moved to Beijing to attend Beijing International Studies University, where he received a bachelor's degree in tourism management with a concentration in meeting, incentive, conference, and exhibition. In the summer of 2008, right before the Beijing Olympics started, he flew to the United States to pursue a master's degree in events management at Chico State. Upon graduation, Lin accepted a fellowship from Penn State and continued his research on MICE and tourism in the Recreation, Park, and Tourism Management Department in State College, Pa.

One of the reasons Lin loves the events industry is that you never know what you are going to get. His experience ranges from working at electronic tradeshows and experimenting with fun gadgets, to serving a group of government officials at an international convention. In September 2010, Lin became a senior consultant for an international convention center in China. Over the past three and half years, he has designed and supervised the evaluation process of five trade shows at the convention center with a total exhibitor attendance of 2,500 and a total professional buyer attendance of 220,000. Lin also consulted for the La Costa Resort with Dr. James Fletcher, and the National Park Service with Dr. Emilyn Sheffield. He worked closely with Chico Performances at Chico State on multiple special events, and with the Central Pennsylvania Convention and Visitor Bureau on a large-scale longitudinal visitor survey.

After all of his experience in the events industry, Lin is very familiar with the practical concerns of the management and evaluation of MICE and has developed a research focus that addresses these issues. He completed his dissertation on exhibitors' trade show performance, which he hopes will "inform trade show organizers on how to evaluate their customers' performance and how to make managerial innovations to improve attendees' level of satisfaction and intention to return."

Lin looks forward to getting to know Cal Poly students and sharing his events industry experience. He also intends to bring students abroad to give them an exclusive look at how people organize events around the world. Lin looks forward to working with the local community and businesses on potential partnerships and internship opportunities. Finally, he is excited to live the "SLO lifestyle," and we are so happy to have him join the RPTA family.

Welcome, Professor Lin!

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