Board of Trustees

Student and faculty government leaders discussed their time at the university with members of the Board of Trustees during the board’s last meeting of the academic year.

Alumni Claire Cormier Thielke, global head of product development for Prologis, and Jeffrey W. Bird, managing director of Bluebird Ventures, will begin their terms with the board on April 1.

Sarah J. Friar, MBA ’00, is the chief financial officer of OpenAI, and Bob Sternfels, BA ’92, is the global managing partner of McKinsey & Company.

Trustees approved the 2025-26 provisional budget and heard an update on federal policy issues during their June meeting. The Board also engaged with faculty and students on civil discourse and learned more about Stanford’s work in AI and data science.

New trustee Jane A. Lauder, who earned her undergraduate degree from Stanford in 1995, is a former senior executive of the Estée Lauder Companies and a current member of its board of directors.

Stanford alumna Lily Sarafan, co-founder and executive chair of TheKey, will succeed Jerry Yang as chair of the Stanford University Board of Trustees starting July 1.

Roelof F. Botha and Peter Salovey will begin their five-year terms on Dec. 1, and Stacy S. Brown-Philpot will begin her five-year term on Feb. 1.

On the 50th anniversary of Stanford’s Statement on Academic Freedom, the Board of Trustees reaffirms its principles and commends the Faculty Senate’s adoption of the Statement on Freedom of Expression and the Institutional Statements Policy.

John Kleinheinz, CEO of Kleinheinz Capital Partners, begins his five-year term on the Stanford Board of Trustees on June 1.

Jerry Yang, chair of the Stanford Board of Trustees, announces Stanford University’s next president.