PRE Students Head West for ULI Annual Fall Meeting
This week, PRE students will fly west to attend ULI Live!, the Urban Land Institute’s annual Fall Meeting and Urban Land Exposition, which takes place from October 25th through the 28th. There they will join over 6,000 industry professionals for one of the most popular and educational events on the calendar of the real estate industry. It has been an eventful month for PRE students, as ULI Live! follows closely in the footsteps of the annual Cornell Real Estate Conference, which students attended on October 13th and 14th in New York City.
The Fall Meeting will bring students together with professionals from throughout the world. The 6,000+ attendee list includes real estate professionals from China, Japan, the Netherlands, Mexico, Brazil, U.K., Indonesia, Australia, German, France, Chile, Venezuela and a number of other countries. The conference also features a number real estate luminaries and renowned keynote speakers including Donald Bren, Chairman of the Irvine Company, Michael Milken, Chairman of the Milken Institute and Robert M. Gates, United States Secretary of Defense from 2006 to 2011.
For most students ULI Live! effectively begins on October 26th and continues throughout the week with mobile workshops, special interest tours, market trends sessions, concurrent sessions, a interactive real estate academy, professional development workshops, the ULI/Stan Ross Real Estate Trends Conference and the 75th ULI anniversary celebration reception, which will feature Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys in concert.
Participation by students in events such as ULI Live!, the Annual Cornell Real Estate Conference and various other industry events is a distinctive feature of the PRE. Much more than typical graduate programs the PRE makes a deliberate effort to provide students with the kind of professional development and direct industry exposure during their studies that will assist them in succeeding out of the gate when they graduate. Conferences such as ULI Live! are just one example of the networking and professional development opportunities that PRE students are encouraged to take advantage of. The PRE is providing each PRE student with contribution towards their travel costs to assist them in attending what will surely be a rewarding experience.
David Funk, Director of the Program in Real Estate, considers industry participation by students to be integral to their graduate experience and individual professional development. “Our students will soon be active participants in the real estate industry and we hope the future leaders of the industry as well. These folks needn’t and shouldn’t wait until graduation to start to get to know their peers and participate in industry events,” said Funk. Adding, “We hope that when PRE students graduate they have an established network of peers and a finger on the pulse of the industry.”
The PRE will also utilize ULI Live! as a recruitment and brand building opportunity. Current PRE students will serve as program ambassadors and represent the PRE throughout the course of the conference, conversing with industry leaders, colleagues and fellow real estate students and providing conference participants with an overview of the PRE and its competitive advantages over other real estate and MBA programs.
For more information regarding the ULI Live! Fall Meeting and other events, please contact the offices of the Cornell Program in Real Estate at (607) 255-7110.