Timothy Knowles has announced that he will step down from his position as Pritzker Director of University of Chicago Urban Labs and Chairman of the University’s Urban Education Institute in February, 2017.

Knowles will be working with Mark Walter, CEO of Guggenheim Partners, to create a new enterprise that will help identify, develop, and hire exceptional talent from highly disadvantaged communities across the country. The scale will be significant. The organization expects to engage tens of thousands of young people in the years ahead, spanning K12 to career. The work will be self-sustaining, supported by companies with which they partner, start and acquire.  

“Tim’s experience and enthusiasm have been invaluable to Urban Labs,” said Kelly Hallberg, Managing Director of Urban Labs. “We cannot thank him enough for the contributions he’s made to our current and future success and will miss him as we continue to expand our efforts to help improve urban lives.”

Knowles helped to launch Urban Labs in early 2015 in order to promote interdisciplinary efforts to help cities and civic leaders address challenges across five key dimensions of urban life: crime, education, health, poverty, and energy & environment. He came to the the University of Chicago in 2003, and established the Urban Education Institute, an organization dedicated to creating knowledge to produce reliably excellent urban schools nationwide.

“The decision to embark on a new adventure was not easy.  The University of Chicago has been a wonderful place to work on countless fronts - and the work of the Urban Labs and the Urban Education Institute have remarkable traction. Urban Labs is in an excellent state. We have a remarkable team, deep partnerships on many fronts, and significant demand for the work we do. The breadth of work achieved is stunning and it has been a tremendous privilege to participate in the birth of such a promising institution.”

Tim will work closely with University and Urban Labs leaders to ensure a seamless transition and the continued success of the organization.

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