U of I Board of Trustees extends system president’s contract

Bradley Zimmerman
·2 min read
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SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WCIA) — The President of the University of Illinois System is officially sticking around for another three years.

The University Board of Trustees approved on Thursday a three-year contract extension for President Tim Killeen, which will take effect on July 1. The board announced its intension to extend Killeen in February and unanimously approved the extension at its March meeting.

Without the extension, Killeen’s contract would have expired in June.

“I thank the trustees for this vote of confidence in the work we’re all doing across the University of Illinois System,” Killeen said in a statement. “I am incredibly proud of the progress we’ve made on behalf of our students, our faculty and the people of Illinois since 2015.

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“There have been challenges, to be sure,” he added. “But the success of everyone across the system – our trustees included – in building record enrollment, growing access, holding down student costs, driving innovative research and working with state leaders to propel our universities forward is deeply inspiring. We really are firing on all cylinders.”

The contract extension will take effect on July 1. Killeen’s current salary of $917,000 per year will remain the same, and he will be eligible for any university merit-based salary program not to exceed what is available for all system administrators.

Killeen has been President of the U of I System since 2015 and he received his current contract in 2020. His tenure, officials said, has seen record enrollment for 10 straight years, fundraising campaigns have raised $3.6 billion, $500 million more than the original goal, and funding for research has grown to over $1 billion.

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In addition, Killeen’s tenure saw the creation of the Discovery Partners Institute (DPI) and the Illinois Innovation Network (IIN) to fuel economic and workforce development across the state. In 2020, the university system created a saliva-based COVID-19 test and testing network — SHIELD Illinois and Sheid T3 — that helped the State of Illinois navigate the COVID pandemic in a way that saved lives.

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