Lehigh University creates real estate minor.

Capitalizing on the paltry options many colleges and universities offer undergrads in the way of real estate curriculum, Lehigh University is creating a real estate minor that has already garnered attention and support from some of the biggest names in the business in Manhattan.

Cushman & Wake field's Tara Stacom, a Lehigh alum, has taken an active role in crafting some of the program's coursework and is spearheading its fundraising.

She said that the minor, to be called ire@1, or integrated real estate at Lehigh, offers advantages over other real estate programs because its allows students to study real estate for up to four years, or the entire length of their undergraduate studies, and also is open to students in all majors.

Most schools provide real estate courses only to upperclassmen in select majors such as finance and business, Stacom said.

"This program is for anybody really interested in real estate, from architects to English majors," Stacom said.

"Often students get to really study real estate only in graduate school. This program is going to submerge the students much sooner and more thoroughly." Other supporters of the program are Newmark Knight Frank principal and CEO Barry Gosin and SL Green's president and CEO Marc Holliday, a Lehigh alum. Gosin, who is among a group of investors planning to develop a nearly $900 million mixed use development on an abandoned steel factory site in Bethlehem, the Pennsylvania city where Lehigh is located, has pledged to partake in the program by allowing students to observe and participate in the development process for his project.

"The class will get to come in and learn from Barry about all the things that go into realizing a development like this," Stacom said.

"Everyone in the class will get assigned to do a report analyzing a specific aspect of the development, such as the financing, the feasibility of the project, the architecture, the various infrastructure, the leasing. At the end they will combine that into one big feasibility report that analyzes the development in as detailed and sophisticated a way as the actual developers themselves."

Both Tara and her sister, CBRE's top investment sales broker Darcy, who is also a Lehigh alum, have conducted classes for the university on real estate and both may provide internships and hold practicum classes here in the city.

"This program will be an important recruiting ground for major firms looking for young talent," Stacom said.

"When you recruit somebody, you want to know that they're really into real estate, not just going to be at the company for a year and then decide that it's not for them.

"Unlike so many other programs, this one allows students to participate for four years, which means that at the end, if they want to go into real estate you can bet that they're sure they want to stick with it."