Today’s meeting of the University of Illinois Board of Trustees represented the final business session for Chairman Donald Edwards, who is retiring from the board after eight years of service — including the past six years as chairman.
During Edwards’ tenure as board chairman, the University of Illinois System continued to build upon its research enterprise; froze resident base undergraduate tuition in three of the past six years; increased financial aid substantially to its current level of $298 million a year; and achieved record levels of enrollment.
“On behalf of our system leadership team and the administrations of our three outstanding universities, I would like to thank Chairman Edwards for his broad vision for achieving excellence at scale, his strategic approach to charting a course for the system, and his skillful and respectful coordination of a talented team of trustees,” President Tim Killeen said. “His relentless focus on alignment around our goals of excellence, access and affordability for our students and the people of Illinois provided a consistent guiding light, even during an exceptionally challenging era for universities that included an unprecedented pandemic and global conflict.
“Chairman Edwards is a proud alumnus and an ambassador in proclaiming the profound role that his University of Illinois education has played in his life,” Killeen said. “During his tireless service on the board, we have achieved remarkable results in extending similar opportunities to so many thousands of students — something that I know means so much to him.”
An alumnus of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Edwards has served as a trustee since 2017. The Chicago resident is CEO of Flexpoint Ford, a Chicago-based private equity investment firm he founded in 2004.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in finance with University Honors (Bronze Tablet) and also was a four-year letter-winner on the Illini golf team from 1985 to 1988. He later received an MBA from Harvard Business School with Baker Scholar Distinction.
Annual state funding request
Trustees approved the board’s annual state funding request for the fiscal year that begins July 1. The request will be submitted for consideration by the Illinois Board of Higher Education, Gov. JB Pritzker and the Legislature.
The proposal’s total operating funds request of $804.4 million would provide a 13.2% increase from the current year’s $710.6 million appropriation.
The requested increase would support four goals: keeping more Illinois students in the state and supporting their success; enhancing academic excellence by recruiting and retaining faculty and staff; accounting for inflationary and other cost increases; and support for other state-funded operations.
The system has more than 97,700 students, 28,000 full-time equivalent faculty and staff and almost 870,000 alumni. It awards more than 27,000 degrees a year and contributes $19 billion annually to the Illinois economy.
Illinois residents represent about 79% of system undergraduate students. Two-thirds of system undergraduates receive financial aid and more than half of undergraduates pay tuition of less than $3,000 per semester.
Contract extension
Trustees also approved a two-year contract extension for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign women’s basketball head coach Shauna Green that will extend her through the 2029-30 season and provides opportunities for up to four additional one-year extensions if performance thresholds are met.
Appointments
- Lowa Mwilambwe, currently the associate vice chancellor for auxiliary, health and wellbeing at Urbana, was appointed the university’s interim vice chancellor for administration and operations.
- Gabriel S. Cagwin was appointed vice chancellor for advancement at the University of Illinois Springfield and senior vice president of the University of Illinois Foundation. Cagwin, who has served in those roles in a designate capacity since Sept. 30, previously was vice president of development at Chapman University in California.
