The University of Nebraska Board of Regents will meet at 9 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 9, in the UNK Regional Engagement Center, 2204 University Drive, in Kearney. The meeting is open to the public and will be livestreamed at www.nebraska.edu.
A detailed agenda for the meeting is available here.
The meeting will be held on the campus of the University of Nebraska at Kearney. Prior to the meeting, the Board will hear updates on the UNK Health Sciences program, the aviation program and plans to update and modernize portions of Bruner Hall. Members of the Board will also tour the Health Sciences Education Complex II, which opened earlier this year.
During the meeting, the Board will consider a revised program statement for Project Health, the future primary teaching hospital for the University of Nebraska Medical Center and Nebraska Medicine, currently under construction on the Medical Center campus.
The Board of Regents approved Project Health’s original program statement in June 2024. In the time since, with input from Nebraska Medicine clinical leadership, it has become clear that more space will be needed to support greater patient volumes and higher learner enrollment in the future. The project will expand and modernize clinical capacity to ensure beds and specialized services are available for patients with the most complex needs, including those referred from across the region. The project also enables the retirement of aging facilities, including Clarkson Tower, and the phased modernization of existing inpatient space. Ultimately, the updated scope aims to provide the inpatient, surgical, interventional, laboratory, education, and research capacity needed to support future growth.
The revised program statement to be considered by the Board calls for a 1.5 million-square-foot facility, up from the 1.25 million square feet originally envisioned. This expanded scope will better position the facility to meet Nebraska’s future health care and workforce needs. Together with rising construction costs, the additional space represents an anticipated investment of approximately $500 million beyond the original estimate.
“Project Health represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to expand Nebraskans’ access to world-class medical care and redefine academic medical training through meaningful, hands-on opportunities in a state-of-the-art facility,” said NU System President Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D. “I commend the board for recognizing these additional needs early in the process. By addressing them through a single, integrated investment, we can improve efficiency, avoid significant future costs and create a modern clinical platform that will serve patients, learners and our state for decades to come.”
In other business, the Board:
- Will hear presentations from UNK leadership and from the UNMC Transplant Team;
- Will consider a proposal to name the Franchising Program for Entrepreneurship at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s College of Business the Hogan Franchise Leadership Program;
- Will consider a proposal to eliminate the Genome Editing and Education Center in the UNMC’s College of Medicine;
- Will consider a proposal to rename the Bachelor of Science in Sport and Recreation Management at University of Nebraska at Kearney the Bachelor of Science in Sport Management, and to change the home department from the Department of Kinesiology and Sport Sciences in the College of Education to the Department of Marketing, Agribusiness and Supply Chain Management in the College of Business and Technology.