Jeff Barber elected 18th chair of Johns Hopkins University board of trustees

Jeffrey S. Barber's connections and commitment to Johns Hopkins University span decades—first as an accomplished student; then as a volunteer and member of multiple boards, including as 12-year tenure on the university's board of trustees; as a teacher of a popular financial literacy Intersession course for undergrads for many years; and as a philanthropic supporter of a wide range of JHU programs and professorships.

Barber was elected as the 18th chair of JHU's board of trustees and will begin a six-year term on July 1, succeeding Louis J. Forster, who will remain on the board.

Image caption: Jeff Barber

"Johns Hopkins has been a special place to me since I first stepped on campus in 1991. Since then, my admiration for the institution and its people has only grown," Barber said. "Hopkins is a place of incredible impact where the pursuit of knowledge meets the passion for making a difference.

"I am honored to be the board's next chair," he added. "Trustees, in partnership with university administration, work tirelessly to advance the mission of Johns Hopkins, and I am privileged to work alongside such a talented and committed group."

The Johns Hopkins University board of trustees, originally formed in 1867, has fiduciary responsibility for advancing JHU's mission and goals through stewardship of its resources for the common good and for generations to come. The board also guards the university's integrity and reputation, ensuring that it fulfills the purposes for which it was established.

Barber earned a bachelor's degree in political science from Johns Hopkins in 1995, with all university and departmental honors, and went on to receive an MBA with honors from Columbia Business School in 2001 as a Beta Gamma Sigma Scholar. He currently serves as managing director at TA Associates, a leading global private equity investment firm based in Boston.

Barber joined the university's board in 2013 and has served on almost every one of its committees, as well as on SNF Agora Institute's board of overseers, the university's lacrosse advisory board, and the Krieger School of Arts and Science's advisory board, of which he is a former chair. He received the University's Heritage Award in 2012, an honor given annually to alumni and friends who have contributed outstanding service over an extended period to the progress of the university.

"Jeff embodies the Hopkins ethos—thoughtful, curious, and humane," said Ron Daniels, president of Johns Hopkins University. "In his three decades of service to his alma mater, Jeff has provided wise counsel and boundless support, whether he is cheering on his beloved Blue Jays from the Nest or helping us navigate the ever-changing landscape of higher education. I am delighted to partner with him as we chart Hopkins' future through the 150th anniversary and beyond."

Barber and his wife, Kimberly Hsu Barber, met at Hopkins and both graduated from the Krieger School in 1995. They have three children, and together they have made many family visits to the Homewood campus over the years.

The two have generously supported scholarships and projects across the university, including several central to the Homewood campus student experience—among them the renovation of Gilman Hall and the construction of Charles Commons (now Scott-Bates Commons). They also played a lead role in the creation of the Men's Lacrosse Champions Fund in 2018 to help the nine-time NCAA champion Blue Jays continue to compete at the highest level of the sport.

In 2008, they endowed the Kimberly and Jeffrey Barber Family Scholarship in support of undergraduate education, an award the puts on emphasis on providing equal access to education. The Thomas J. Barber Professorship of Physics and Astronomy, a distinguished faculty position held by Nobel laureate Adam Riess, is named in honor of Barber's father. In 2018, Barber authored an essay for Johns Hopkins Magazine about traveling to Cape Canaveral, Florida, to watch the momentous launch of the Parker Solar Probe—a spacecraft designed and built by scientists at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab—with his father, a mechanical engineer who "spent years studying the problems and possibilities of human flight and space travel, designing engines that could propel machines and humans into the ether."

A more recent gift from the Barbers includes support for Hopkins athletics, professorships at the SNF Agora Institute, the Hopkins Student Center, and a School of Education scholarship fund named in honor of Jeff Barber's mother, who spent her career as a K-12 teacher.