Lake Forest College

Jill Wilkerson joined the Forester cross country and track and field coaching staffs in 2022 and was named the associate head coach of both programs in the summer of 2025.

For the second year in a row, Lake Forest's women's cross country team finished fifth at the 2024 Midwest Conference Championship Meet while the men placed eighth. Sophie Graham repeated as an All-MWC honoree by placing 18th while Ali Faiz was 45th to lead the men's team. Twenty-one members of the program, including a record nine men, were named Academic All-MWC.

Forester cross country runners have now been named all-conference three times since Wilkerson joined the program. They have also earned 60 Academic All-MWC accolades during that span.

Wilkerson works primarily with the distance runners during the spring. In her three seasons on staff, members of the Forester track and field team running at least 800m have broken six school records, made 25 additional updates to the program's list of the top five performers in each event, and captured a conference title in the men's 800m (Ollie Francis).

Prior to coming to Lake Forest, Wilkerson was a graduate assistant coach at Aurora University, where she helped lead the men's and women's track and field teams to runner-up finishes at the 2021 Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference Outdoor Championships. The Spartans also finished in the top five in the league in cross country in 2021 and in both indoor and outdoor track and field in 2022.

A graduate of Augustana College, Wilkerson finished out her cross country career with a ninth-place finish at the 2019 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin Championship Meet before placing 24th to earn all-region honors at the NCAA Division III Midwest Regional. In track she qualified for the 2020 NCAA Division III Championship Meet in the mile and still owns the program's fourth-fastest time in that event.

In addition to coaching, Wilkerson is also a coordinator in the College's Department of Advancement.