Trustees elect new officers

INDIANAPOLIS — Purdue University’s Board of Trustees on Friday (Oct. 4) elected Gary Lehman as chair and Mike Klipsch as vice chair, effective Jan. 1, 2025.

The action comes after the announcement that current chair Michael Berghoff will retire from the board at the end of 2024.

“Purdue University is extremely fortunate to have had a dedicated, thoughtful and stable board of trustees for many years,” President Mung Chiang said. “The long-standing excellence of the board continues with today’s announcement. Gary Lehman is not only the most loyal Boilermaker and an outstanding business leader, he has also been a revered leader in our state and the Greater Lafayette community for many decades. Similarly, Mike Klipsch has made tremendous contributions to his alma mater and has always provided deep insight to the many dimensions of our university as the most consequential public university in the country. I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know these two exceptional Boilermakers over the past two years, and I am enthusiastically looking forward to working closely with them, as the incoming chair and vice chair of the board, to continue advancing Purdue University.”

Lehman has been a trustee since 2010, has served as vice chair for the past four years, and has served on the board’s physical facilities, compensation and finance committees. A 1974 Purdue industrial management graduate, he also holds an MBA with honors from Case Western University. Lehman is the retired chairman and CEO of Oerlikon Fairfield and is the founder of Cannelton Group. He serves on the board of several civic and business organizations, including the Indiana Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Lafayette Chamber of Commerce, Meridian Health Services and First Merchants Corp. His Purdue service includes involvement in the Krannert Alumni Association Board, the Krannert Dean’s Advisory Council, the Athletic Affairs Committee and eight university search committees. Lehman serves on the Purdue Research Foundation Board of Directors and the John Purdue Club Brees Leadership Circle.

Klipsch, a 1985 Purdue industrial management graduate, has been a trustee since 2015 and a member of the physical facilities, finance and compensation committees. He had a 20-year career with Klipsch Group, a family owned and operated holding company for a wide variety of consumer electronics brands, and continues to pursue new entrepreneurial opportunities. He serves on the Purdue Research Foundation Board of Directors, the Purdue Global Board of Trustees, and the John Purdue Club Brees Leadership Circle and was a 2016 Purdue Old Master. He has been actively involved with the American Cancer Society, the Make-A-Wish Foundation and Boy Scouts of America.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a public research institution demonstrating excellence at scale. Ranked among top 10 public universities and with two colleges in the top four in the United States, Purdue discovers and disseminates knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 105,000 students study at Purdue across modalities and locations, including nearly 50,000 in person on the West Lafayette campus. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 13 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its first comprehensive urban campus in Indianapolis, the Mitch Daniels School of Business, Purdue Computes and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.