The following announcement was emailed to all University of Illinois System employees regarding the national search for our next System president:

Dear University of Illinois System community,

I am pleased to share that the leadership profile for the next president of the University of Illinois System is complete, and formal recruiting to find the 21st president is now underway.

This is an exciting milestone, and it belongs to all of us. The profile was shaped by the recommendations of our Search Committee and the input of faculty, staff, students, and community members who joined our town halls or shared their thoughts through the search portal or by email. Your voices are reflected throughout it, and the board is grateful for the care and candor you brought to the process.

This role is one of stewardship and possibility: Our next president will assume leadership of a system with extraordinary strength and momentum that serves more students, conducts more research, and delivers greater impact than ever before, with record enrollment, expanded access and affordability, and one of the nation's premier public research and health care enterprises. They will build on this legacy and help define what comes next for public higher education. Above all, we expect this leader to be an unyielding champion of the students, faculty, and staff who carry our mission forward every day.

I am confident this profile will attract a strong, diverse, and eminently qualified field of candidates from across the country and around the world. The Board of Trustees, the Search Committee, and AGB Search will now use it as our guide the recruiting process.

The search will be confidential from this point forward, with the goal of concluding by the end of the 2026 calendar year. Updates will be shared at key milestones on our Presidential Search site.

Thank you again for your thoughtful participation, and for the dedication and excellence you bring to the University of Illinois System every day.

Sincerely,

Jesse Ruiz, Chair, University of Illinois Board of Trustees
BA, Economics, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1988