The Oregon Senate voted Thursday to confirm the 14 people with ties to the University of Oregon who were appointed by Gov. John Kitzhaber this summer to serve on the UO's inaugural Board of Trustees.

The confirmed trustees include UO alumni, friends, faculty and staff members, and a student. Biographies of each are available on the university's Board of Trustees website.

"Governor Kitzhaber appointed an outstanding group of individuals to the University of Oregon’s new Board of Trustees, and we are delighted by the Senate’s action today to confirm them so they may begin their important work on behalf of the university and the state of Oregon," UO President Michael Gottfredson said. "They have an outstanding collective commitment to our mission of research, service, and instruction, and I look forward to working together to advance the UO as one of the nation’s premier public research universities."

President Gottfredson met with several of the new trustees earlier this fall, when they were in Salem for a hearing before the Senate's Interim Committee on Rules and Executive Appointments. The committee forwarded the list of trustee appointees to the full Senate, which deferred the confirmation vote until this month. President Gottfredson, and senior UO leaders, also met with the Trustees as part of orientation sessions that were open to the public.

The Legislature voted before adjourning in July to approve Senate Bill 270, which established institutional boards of trustees for the UO and Portland State University. The bill also gave Oregon State University the option of establishing an institutional board – which its leaders subsequently chose to do – and lays out a process for Oregon's other public institutions to establish institutional boards. 

- from the UO Office of Strategic Communications