UO President Michael Schill is leaving to become the next president of Northwestern University this fall. UO Board of Trustees Chair Ginevra Ralph announced it to the campus community. Northwestern also put out an announcement on its website.
Schill became president of the UO in 2015, since then he has retained the university’s relationship with former Nike CEO Phil Knight. While Schill was president he scored $1B from Knight for the new science research campus, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars for Hayward field renovations and other projects. Schill infamously stepped out of a meeting with GTFF to take a call from Phil Knight.
Meanwhile Schill’s UO has been stingy about giving raises to workers and has attempted to make cuts to healthcare.
In 2017 students took the stage where Schill was set to give a state of the university speech to protest the tuition hikes and lack of effort by the administration to protect BIPOC students. Schill responded with a NY Times op-ed saying that their actions were similar to those utilized by fascists.
Ralph says she expects an interim president to begin serving prior to the start of the academic year. The Board of Trustees will hold its next meeting Sep. 15-16 and they will discuss the starting the search process for a new president.