Education
PhD, University of California, Los Angeles
Rabbinic Ordination, Jewish Theological Seminary
MBA, Baruch College
M.A., Jewish Theological Seminary
M.A., University of California, Los Angeles
B.A., University of California, Los Angeles
Bio
Dr. Robert D. Wexler served as president of American Jewish University (formerly University of Judaism and Brandeis-Bardin Institute) from 1992 - 2018. He first attended AJU as a student from 1968-1973 and returned to the university in 1978 as the assistant dean of students.
He received his B.A. in Sociology from UCLA in 1971 and was ordained as a rabbi at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, where he also earned a Master of Arts degree in Hebrew Literature. While enrolled in rabbinical school, Dr. Wexler also earned his M.B.A. degree from Baruch College in New York City with a specialization in accounting. Following his ordination in 1977, he spent a year on the faculty of Princeton University teaching in the Department of Middle East Studies.
Dr. Wexler occupied a variety of administrative positions at AJU before becoming president. He earned both a Master of Arts degree and a Ph.D. from UCLA in the Department of Near Eastern Languages. His doctoral dissertation dealt with concepts of death and immortality in the ancient near east.
Dr. Wexler founded the Ziegler School for Rabbinic Studies in 1996 and brought about the incorporation of the Brandeis-Bardin Institute into the American Jewish University in 2006. During his tenure he increased the size of the University’s endowment fund from $5 million to over $100 million in 2018.