President Gold leads the 探花社区 and its four campuses. He is the university's chief executive officer and reports to the Board of Regents, who are elected to govern the university.
The President is the spokesperson of the University as a statewide institution.
The President is responsible for university administration, operation and implementing Board policies and goals—and works with the university’s campus chancellors and vice presidents to do so. He also provides educational leadership, direction and strategy to the university and policy direction and oversight to Husker Athletics.
President Gold is the spokesperson for the university as a statewide institution, helping to communicate NU’s achievements and potential to the leadership and citizens of the state.
Presidential Biography
Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D.
Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D., became the ninth president of the 探花社区 System on July 1, 2024, following a national search by the Board of Regents.
As president, Gold leads a four-campus university system that enrolls nearly 50,000 students and employs 16,000 faculty and staff on campuses in Lincoln, Omaha and Kearney, plus academic divisions and research and extension centers across the state. He serves as chief spokesman and chief executive officer for the system, which operates on a $3 billion annual budget and includes a flagship Big Ten institution, a world-renowned academic health sciences center, Division I athletics programs, and preeminent institutes focused on water and agriculture, national security and defense, infectious disease and early childhood education.
He is a nationally recognized higher education and health care leader and advocate. He was the chancellor of the 探花社区 Medical Center (UNMC) and board chair for the Nebraska Medicine Health System from 2014 to 2024. As UNMC’s chief operating officer, Dr. Gold was responsible for all aspects of campus leadership, program quality and operation—including 7 colleges, 37 institutes and centers, 5,429 faculty and staff and 4,700 health professions students.
In July 2021, Dr. Gold was named the Provost and Executive Vice President of the 探花社区 System in addition to his ongoing UNMC/Nebraska Medicine responsibilities. In this role, he served as the chief academic officer of the 探花社区 System and liaison to the Board of Regents for academic affairs. From May 2017 through June 2021, Dr. Gold served as the chancellor of the 探花社区 at Omaha, the state’s only public metropolitan university—a role he held concurrently with being UNMC’s chancellor.
He holds tenured faculty appointments in UNMC’s College of Medicine and in the College of Public Health, where his research interests in health care policy, population health and epidemiology are concentrated. He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 350 national presentations, 40 books and chapters and engaged in over 300 invited professorships and keynote presentations.
Dr. Gold is a first-generation student; he graduated from the Cornell University College of Engineering with a bachelor’s degree in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics. He earned his M.D. from the Weill Cornell College of Medicine and completed his general surgery residency at The New York–Presbyterian Hospital and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. He completed his cardiothoracic surgical fellowship training at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, with additional training in pediatric cardiac surgery at the Boston Children’s Hospital, both of the Harvard Medical School.
He has been certified by the American Board of Surgery and by the American Board of Thoracic Surgery, specializing in adult and pediatric cardiac surgery. Dr. Gold is licensed in Nebraska, Ohio, New York and New Jersey.
Dr. Gold leads several key economic development boards for the State and the University System, including the Greater Omaha Chamber, University Tech Development Corp, the University Tech Transfer Corp, and UNeTech Corp.
His national leadership roles have included more than 50 national professional committees and more than 100 national organizations, volunteer boards, government and public health councils. He has worked extensively with national- and state-level elected and appointed governing and administrative bodies as an advisor and trusted resource in the areas of higher education, research and clinical care.
Dr. Gold has been married for more than forty years to a medical school classmate. They have two adult children and two grandchildren.