Illinois e-News Release

Carolyn Blackwell will serve as a Member of the University of Illinois Board of Trustees.* Blackwell has over twenty years of financial management and accounting experience, and currently serves as a Senior Accountant with Champaign Asphalt Company. Previously, she served as the Corporate Accounting Manager for Core Spaces, LLC, as an Accounting Consultant for YG Financial Group, and as the Accounting Manager for Campus Acquisitions, LLC. Blackwell has experience volunteering with Champaign-Urbana Downtown Independent Volunteer Association and as a Champaign Central High School Volleyball Booster Club Board Member. She received a Bachelor of Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Jesse Ruiz will serve as a Member of the University of Illinois Board of Trustees.* Ruiz currently serves as Partner, General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer of The Vistria Group, LP. Previously, Ruiz was the Deputy Governor for Education in the Office of Illinois Governor JB Pritzker. In that role, he oversaw the state’s education system from early childhood through higher education, including 852 school districts, 48 community colleges, and twelve public universities, as well as the Illinois Student Assistance Commission and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. Prior to serving as Deputy Governor, Ruiz was a Partner in the Corporate & Securities Group of Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP, where for 22 years he focused his law practice on business transactions including mergers and acquisitions, venture capital and private equity investments, equity and debt offerings, financings, and a variety of commercial transactions. Throughout his career, Ruiz has served in a variety of public roles including President of the Chicago Park District Board of Commissioners, Commission on the Public Building Commission, Vice President of the Chicago Board of Education, Interim CEO of Chicago Public Schools, and Chairman of the Illinois State Board of Education. Ruiz received a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Chicago Law School.