Heather Templeton Dill is Director of the Templeton Prize, one of the main programs of the John Templeton Foundation. Dill served as president and CEO of the Foundation from 2015 to 2025. Prior to assuming this role in 2015, she served as executive liaison to the president under her father, the late Dr. Jack Templeton. Dill is the granddaughter of the late Sir John Templeton.
The Templeton Prize, valued at $1.3 million, is one of the world’s largest annual individual awards to honor individuals whose exemplary achievements advance her grandfather’s philanthropic vision: harnessing the power of the sciences to explore the deepest questions of the universe and humankind’s place and purpose within it. Winners have come from all major faiths and dozens of countries and have included Nobel Prize laureates, philosophers, theoretical physicists, and one canonized saint.
As president of the Foundation, Dill led the effort to rebrand the Templeton Prize in 2019, including rearticulating the purpose of the Prize, updating the selection process, and creating greater visibility for what has always been one of Sir John Templeton’s most significant philanthropic investments. During Dill’s tenure, the Prize was awarded to luminaries such as Dr. Francis Collins (2020), Dr. Jane Goodall (2021), and His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew (2025).
Today, the John Templeton Foundation administers the Templeton Prize on behalf of the Templeton philanthropies, which include the John Templeton Foundation, the Templeton World Charity Foundation, and the Templeton Religion Trust.
Dill holds a master’s degree in American history from Villanova University and is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame with a B.A. in history and a concentration in public policy.
