UIUC chancellor says she will resign, resume tenured faculty role

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Chancellor Phyllis M. Wise has announced that she has resigned from her administrative roles and will take up a tenured faculty position in the School of Molecular and Cellular Biology. In turn, the university informed Wise today that it will not initiate administrative dismissal proceedings aimed at removing her as chancellor of the Urbana campus and vice president of the university.

In letters to U of I President Timothy Killeen and Board of Trustees Chairman Edward McMillan on Thursday evening, Wise tendered her resignation as chancellor and vice president and declined an administrative reassignment that Killeen had made on Wednesday.

“Effective immediately, I will resume my position as a tenured member of the faculty in the School of Molecular and Cellular Biology,” Wise wrote.

Killeen and McMillan separately responded to Wise, acknowledging receipt of her communication and thanking Wise for her administrative service to the university.

“Please be advised that Article IX, Section 10 administrative dismissal proceedings will not be initiated,” in light of Wise’s administrative resignation, McMillan informed Wise.

On Wednesday, Killeen reassigned the four-year chancellor to duties reporting directly to him and named as acting chancellor Barbara J. Wilson, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, effective immediately.