Message from Chancellor Strom

October 30, 2025

Dear RBHS Community:
 
Since I joined RBHS in December 2013, my goal has been to build one of the best academic health centers in the country, with an emphasis on one. After serving for twelve years as the inaugural Chancellor of Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences, I look back at all we have accomplished together with great pride and admiration. It is now time for RBHS to seek new leadership and begin a new era of achievement. I have informed President Tate that I will be stepping down as Chancellor effective at the end of this semester. 
 
In our first decade as New Jersey’s premier academic health center, RBHS (now branded as Rutgers Health) made substantial progress towards becoming one of the best academic health centers in the nation. We successfully completed the largest and most ambitious higher education merger ever attempted in the nation’s history, bringing a newly invigorated Rutgers into the Twenty-first Century as a fundamentally transformed institution. We reorganized schools, departments, institutes, and centers; built a strong leadership team; recruited world-renowned academic and clinical leaders; restructured our promotion processes; invested in our people and infrastructure; developed and implemented two consecutive strategic plans; and embarked on a sustainable trajectory of growth and excellence.
 
As we entered our second decade, we continued this momentum, thriving despite the massive environmental challenges posed by the pandemic (with the university response guided by and partially led by us). We continued increasing research funding steadily year-over-year, recruiting, retaining, and developing strong academic and clinical leadership, and fostering academic excellence, while providing comprehensive and top-ranked advanced degree programs. We began the monumental task of merging our two medical schools into a single world-class school, and initiated transformational capital projects, some now nearing completion, all supported by our new branding and identity campaign and led by a new team. Our new Rutgers Health Building on the Helix site in New Brunswick will open this spring and be the new home to Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and 80 principal investigators, located near the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital to serve as a major opportunity to continue to grow clinical and translational research. We also just broke ground in Newark on buildings to replace at last most of the temporary “trailers” from almost 60 years ago. The Medical Science Building in Newark is undergoing major renovation to permit our students there to have facilities comparable to those soon to open in New Brunswick.
 
As a testament to the energy and enterprise of our faculty, in FY 2025, total Rutgers Health research awards reached over $608 million, our biggest year yet. Rutgers Health’s NIH funding alone has increased 51% since FY 2019. Rutgers University alone now garners 75% of all NIH funding that flows into the State of New Jersey. Over 70% of Rutgers University's NIH funding now comes from Rutgers Health.
 
Thanks to all your efforts, Rutgers Health has established itself as a financially sound, academically rigorous, and nationally recognized academic health center, steadily advancing toward the goal of becoming one of the country’s premier institutions. Guided by sound strategic planning, disciplined financial stewardship, investment in academic excellence, and strong partnerships, we have achieved significant progress in research, education, clinical care, and capital development. The integration of our medical schools and the development of transformative facilities all represent deliberate steps toward long-term sustainability and excellence. Rutgers Health is well-positioned to expand its impact on healthcare delivery, workforce development, and biomedical innovation, while continuing to serve as a critical resource for the people of New Jersey and the broader region. 
 
Personally, it has been the greatest privilege of my life to serve as your inaugural Chancellor these past twelve years. You have all inspired and amazed me with your passion for knowledge, compassion for your fellow humans, and commitment to making our world a healthier, more humane and equitable place. During the next chapter of Rutgers Health’s history, I challenge each of you to aim higher, dream bigger, and reach even farther to support our patients, students, and the communities we serve. I am supremely confident of your continued success.
 
I look forward to collaborating with President Tate and his leadership team on a seamless and productive transition in preparation for a national search for your next Chancellor. Importantly, I am looking forward to focusing on my passions for mentoring and research, and to spending more time with my two grandchildren. I wish you all the best as you continue this most noble journey to increase and improve the health of each of our individual patients and of our society as a whole.
 
Sincerely,

Brian L. Strom, MD, MPH