The Board of Trustees will meet for a daylong special meeting on Tuesday held in executive session at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare hotel to review candidates for the president of the University, as confirmed by Trustee Karen Hasara. 

Hasara said she does not know how many candidates the presidential search committee has placed on the list for the board to review, and it will be the first time the board looks at the names. Hasara said she believes the meeting Tuesday was put in place in preparation for Thursday’s Board of Trustees meeting, to give the board the possibility of voting on a candidate. 

“It would be wonderful if we could come out with the person we think is the best candidate, but if we can’t do that (Tuesday), we certainly don’t want to rush into anything,” she said.

Thursday’s Board of Trustees meeting will be held in Chicago. It was originally scheduled to be held in Springfield.

The 19-person presidential search committee was formed in April. Since this summer, the committee has narrowed a list that originally started at 200 nominees. 

Previously, Douglas Beck, co-chair of the committee, said he predicted the committee would be able to forward a list of names to the board by Thanksgiving, but the schedule is still subject to the flexibility of the candidates.

“I think it means hopefully we are right on schedule of where we want to be,” she said. “I’d say we all pretty much agree we want someone who can lead the University into the future and has strong academic and leadership abilities — someone (who) gets along well with people and the media.”

Beck and Pam Strobel, co-chairs of the Presidential Search Committee could not be reached by press time.