Trinity International University Resumes Search for New President

Recently installed president announces 2025 retirement

Just six months after beginning his tenure as the 17th president of Trinity International University, Kevin Kompelien announced the presidential seat is back on the market—a development he says was planned from the start.

Kevin Kompelien / Video screenshot

In a public address posted Aug. 30 on TIU’s website, Kompelien explained that his intent to retire in the summer of 2025 carried over from his previous role as head of the Evangelical Free Church of America, TIU’s denominational affiliation.

“When the TIU Board of Regents asked the EFCA Board of Directors to release me to serve as president of Trinity, it was with the understanding that my availability to serve either the EFCA or TIU in a full-time capacity was limited by my plans to retire in the summer of 2025,” Kompelien said. “Since that transition in March, I have been clear about my personal plans and timeline with EFCA leaders, TEDS faculty and staff, and students.”

Kompelien was hired to fill the sudden vacancy caused by the resignation of previous president Nicholas Perrin. That announcement was included in a March 5 statement that also addressed steps TIU was taking to address “immediate budget challenges” and ensure the survival of its divinity school.

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The statement listed cost-cutting measures, including closures and staff layoffs at Trinity College Online, Trinity Graduate School, and the TIU-Florida regional campus. These measures followed previous belt-tightening moves that included cutting the budget by $1 million and moving all undergraduate programs entirely online.

At the time, the choice to appoint Kompelien was explained as advancing TIU’s desire to return to its “roots” as an institution “established to train ministry leaders for a movement of churches that would later become the Evangelical Free Church of America.”

In his August retirement announcement, Kompelien celebrated that TIU has “entered the fall term with strong enrollment and the largest incoming class of students in more than five years,” and said he hopes to “lay a good foundation for the next president.”

The job listing went public on Aug. 9 through Carter Baldwin and is also advertised through the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities. TIU recommends that interested parties contact Carter Baldwin directly by October 5.

In an email shared with MinistryWatch, presidential search committee chairman Bill Riedel assured internal constituents the school is “making good progress in the search.”

“It is early in the process, but I am thrilled to tell you that we are on schedule, if not a little ahead, and very hopeful,” Riedel said. “The most important thing that any of us can do throughout the search is to ask God to move and bring the right person to this important position.”

The next president will be TIU’s fifth since 2009, when Craig Williford was hired after the seat stood vacant for a time following the resignation of Greg Waybright, who served from 1995 to 2007. In June this year, Waybright was honored with the title of president emeritus.

Nationwide, institutions of higher learning have been facing a crisis of high presidential turnover as well as a revolving door of faculty and staff.

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