By Elizabeth Putfark
Grand Campus Living, the student housing division of Lincoln Property Companies, recently announced two new promotions to some of their highest leadership roles: Carol Warren Peddy to Senior Vice President, and Jason White to Vice President.
Both new hires have spent several decades in student housing, an experience which White, one of Grand Campus Living’s original four members, describes as an “amazing evolution.”
“I remember starting in 1996 in a 600 square foot, four-bedroom, two-bath with this horrible furniture. But we had a clubhouse and a pool, and back then I remember thinking, man, this is the best thing ever!”
Since then, White has worked every job in student housing, from community assistant all the way up to vice president.
“I started out working for my rent at UT Tyler and was a maintenance supervisor there for a while. Other than accounting, I’ve literally held every position.”
Despite being Grand Campus’s first regional hire back in 2011, White says he was still surprised and honored by the offer of the vice presidential role in the company following Peddy’s promotion.
“I fully expected that they would interview for vice presidents to replace [Peddy], but they offered it to me. I wasn’t necessarily bucking for it, but I was honored and very happy to take it!” explains White, who is moving up from the role of Assistant Vice President of Operations.
White expects that the next decades in student housing will prove as exciting as the previous three, although in markedly different ways. Two trends he expects to continue and develop are value-adds for owners and service-adds for students.
“For owners, I see a lot starting to look for buildings closer to campus that, although older, can be renovated and added to. We’ll still see a lot of new development, of course, but people are definitely starting to really look hard at older products and see how they can transform them into purpose-built scenarios.
“For students, I think we’re going to see more services – more study rooms that look more like off-site classrooms, tutoring services, and things like dry cleaning and pet walking.”
After an entire career committed to student housing, White is eager to be a part of the next stage in college rentals at Grand Campus Living.
“I’m looking forward to seeing what good things I can do!”
Equal Housing Opportunity
