Jay Alan Gershen holds a bachelor of arts in
psychology from the State University of New York at Buffalo
(1968) and a DDS from the University
of Maryland (1972). After
a one year General Dentistry Internship at Eastman Dental Center, Rochester,
N.Y., he completed both a clinical specialty in pediatric dentistry and a
doctorate in education at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1976.
Concurrently, he served as a postdoctoral scholar in child psychiatry at UCLA's
Neuropsychiatric Institute.
Since 1997, Gershen has served as executive vice chancellor and professor in the School of Dentistry at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. He has played a leadership role to create the University of Colorado's 21st century health sciences center at the former Fitzsimons Medical Army Garrison. The new campus focuses on patient-centered health care and collaborative research models and will educate health professionals as interdisciplinary teams. This $4.3 billion project is providing a public/private model for bioscience discovery and emphasizes the commercialization of basic/translational research. Fitzsimons is the largest medical construction project in the nation and will generate $6 billion per year in economic activity at completion. In addition to assisting the chancellor in administering the health sciences center, Gershen has had responsibility for resource development, external and community affairs, and master planning for the new campus. He played a significant role in raising $202 million from the state of Colorado to fund the educational facilities as well as $65 million in military base closure money from the Department of Defense to fund campus infrastructure. He also worked with the dean of dentistry to obtain $95 million from an entrepreneur to fund a dental education building and support for an orthodontic training program.
Gershen played an active role in the consolidation of the University of Colorado at Denver and the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center, bringing together an undergraduate/graduate general campus with an academic health center. Furthermore, he has been the point person for interactions and collaborations with the business community, and he has worked to reformulate the vision and strategic directions for the bioscience research park at Fitzsimons. He serves on numerous business advisory boards including the Economic Development Corporation of the Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce, the Aurora Economic Development Council, the Adams County Economic Development Council, the Colorado Bioscience Association and the IBM Life Sciences National Advisory Council. As chair of the Governor's Biotechnology Council, he played the pivotal role in bringing together academic institutions, the business community and government across Colorado to develop a statewide bioscience plan. He is also chair of the newly created Colorado Colfax Marathon, raising support for youth fitness programs in the public schools and serves on the advisory committee to the president of the Community College of Aurora.
From 2000-2002 Gershen concurrently served as interim vice president for Academic Affairs and Research for the University of Colorado. He served as the principal academic affairs and research officer for the CU system and was responsible for coordinating the development and review of undergraduate and graduate/professional programs. His responsibilities also included technology, diversity, external affairs and partnerships with the business sector. Gershen played a leadership role in establishing the Tobacco Settlement Research Program for Colorado as well as the University of Colorado Coleman Institute for Cognitive Disabilities which is funded from a $250 million gift to the university. In addition, Gershen was responsible for initiating the reorganization of the technology transfer program at the University of Colorado.
In recent years Gershen has made significant contributions to national policy making and advocacy regarding research, education and health issues. He served as a member of the National Advisory Dental and Craniofacial Research Council of the National Institutes of Health from 1998-2002. Also, Gershen served on the Board of Directors of the Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellowships program. He currently serves on the boards of the newly-constituted National Oral Health Advocacy Committee and the Forsyth Institute. Gershen was a member of the Institute of Medicine Committee on Institutional and Policy Strategies for Increasing the Diversity of the Healthcare Workforce, and he currently serves on the Sullivan Alliance to implement these strategies. He was also a member of the American Dental Education Association's Advisory Committee for the Center for Educational Policy and Research.
Gershen joined the faculty of the School of Dentistry at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1976. He directed the UCLA Mobile Dental Clinic serving children of migrant workers in rural California until 1982 when he was awarded a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellowship and sponsorship by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. In this capacity he worked on health policy issues and legislation in the Full Committee on Energy and Commerce in the U.S. House of Representatives. Gershen served as associate dean for Policy and Program Development (1983-1984) for the School of Dentistry and chaired the Section of Public Health Dentistry from 1988-1995. As acting dean of the dental school (1995-1996), he was the first dental dean in the nation to gain Graduate Medical Education (GME) support funds for all of the postdoctoral programs in the school.
Gershen served as president of the American Association of Dental Schools and Chair of the National Affairs Committee of the American Association for Dental Research. He was influential in the authorization and appropriation of numerous programs supporting dental education and research in the U.S. Congress. Gershen was responsible for initiating the major study of dental education conducted by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, and he initiated the effort in the early 1990s to include dental education in the movement to reform the U.S. health care system. He has served on the Dental Advisory Panel of the Pew Health Professions Commission and on the Task Force on Building Capacity in Primary Care Research of the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research. Gershen served on the board of Oral Health America (formerly American Fund for Dental Health). He also chaired the Health Sciences Committee of the University of California's President's Office for three years in the mid 1990s.
Before assuming full-time administrative positions, Gershen conducted research on issues relevant to dental education, health services and behavioral sciences, and he developed innovative teaching methods for behavioral science curricula. He was co-principal investigator on a grant funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to develop instructional materials for dental providers on cultural diversity and health care delivery. Gershen conducted research regarding dental delivery systems and third-party financing and their effect on the quality of dental care. He was a consultant and evaluator of dental care programs for a variety of public and private sector entities including the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, the Federal Trade Commission, Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, the California Department of Corporations, Blue Cross of California, General Motors/United Auto Workers and several union trust funds. He is credited with developing the first empirically derived outcome measure of oral health status for children. Gershen has delivered presentations to health-related and higher education organizations, and he has authored numerous research articles and policy papers.