Bo J. Bernhard, Ph.D.

Dr. Bo Bernhard’s career began serendipitously, during his years as an undergraduate at Harvard University. There, Bo captained the baseball team and earned an MVP award for the nationally-ranked soccer team. One day, after a game, a professor of Bo’s was amused by his hometown of Las Vegas (revealed when the starting lineups were announced to the crowd), and suggested that Bo write a paper on the exportation of the “Las Vegas” idea across the planet. That paper became a double-major (sociology and psychology) magna cum laude thesis, and launched his career as an academic and internationally-coveted speaker. By the age of 30, Bo had delivered keynotes on six continents, and his perspectives evolved into a popular TED Talk entitled Why Las Vegas Is Smart (LINK). Today, Bo serves as Executive Director at UNLV’s International Gaming Institute, where he leads the world’s largest team dedicated to the scientific study of the fields of gambling, hospitality, and tourism.