Our annual flagship event, The Class Conference, is the biggest student housing conference in Europe. Throughout the day, student housing players, city leadership, and the higher education community come together to discuss the latest trends, celebrate achievements, exchange ideas, and broaden their networks. Together we shape the future of student living, working, and learning in Europe.

Theme

The past decade can be considered nothing less than a miraculous one in human innovation. More ideas and products have been realised than any decade before, with greater flows of people, goods, and services between cities, countries, and continents. In this new, global world order, life goals and work preferences are changing too. It is impossible to ignore the changing role of cities and the pivotal importance of universities and knowledge institutions. Urban living increasingly is characterized by transience and inclination to constant change. Human capital and talent attraction are the driving force behind urban advancement in a competitive order of global cities. The fast changes in modern society are turning our lives in a permanent stage of becoming, and increasingly blurring the environment around us. At The Class of 2020, we have been investigating the future of urban living, working and learning for a footloose generation of international talent. The recognition of the co-revolution being a natural progression for the student living sector inspires us to explore all the blends young people encounter in their living experience. While physical realities meet virtual spaces; the European market is witnessing both an institutionalization and a blurring of PBSA as asset class, embracing innovative lifestyle-specific and hospitality-driven living products. The urban campus is the ultimate mash-up of higher education and novel ways of working and living together. Digitalization is disrupting our perception and experience of space and creates learning ecosystems beyond proximity. We enjoyed exploring these topics together with you and 800 other thought leaders in real estate investment, development and operations, international higher education, and city leadership.