UC Santa Cruz Chancellor M.R.C. Greenwood became the first woman to be appointed to the UC system’s second-highest position on Feb. 23.

The UC Regents announced in a special meeting that Greenwood would become UC provost and senior vice president of academic affairs beginning April 1.

“M.R.C. Greenwood possesses tremendous energy, academic accomplishment and administrative skill,” said UC President Robert C. Dynes, who submitted Greenwood’s nomination to the Board of Regents, in a Feb. 23 statement. “She brings the perfect credentials to this position.”

Over the past eight years with Greenwood at its helm, UCSC has seen the addition of two new residential colleges, a 54-percent increase in enrollment, a doubling in the number of its academic programs and the opening of its first professional school.

“As I said upon my arrival, UC Santa Cruz is ‘a jewel in the crown’ of the university,” Greenwood said in a statement to the UCSC community. “Yet, we find ourselves with ‘the whole crown’ — the entire university — at risk in most perilous times.”

Greenwood, who was recommended from a pool of about 60 candidates, will oversee planning, research and academic policies for the entire 10-campus system.

She stressed that the university, in times of “fiscal crisis,” needs to increase understanding of its impact on the state and its students.

“Both political pressure and budgetary constraints are making it increasingly difficult for all public universities, even the great ones like UC, to prosper,” she said. “Whether California will honor the promises of the internationally revered Master Plan for Higher Education is a question we must face. It is in the context of addressing these far-reaching challenges that I join the Office of the President.”

Upon her appointment, she said she viewed becoming the highest-ranking woman in the UC system as a positive example for others in higher education.

“If you look around the nation, women are beginning to appear in senior leadership positions in higher education,” Greenwood said. “This is something I think that for many of our young professors … and other people who are looking for role models, it [is] probably a healthy thing for them to see men and women in these positions, and particularly during difficult times.”

Greenwood will receive a $380,000 salary. Four of the 12 Regents opposed the amount, citing the university’s budget crisis.

Greenwood is a renowned expert in both science and higher education policy issues, and has testified at legislative hearings in Sacramento and Washington, D.C., on issues such as faculty gender equity and national security.

Most recently, she was responsible for launching a partnership between the University of California and NASA in October 2003 that would allow the university to work with NASA at the proposed NASA Research Park in Silicon Valley.

Greenwood has also taught biology and internal medicine at UC Davis. She is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and has also served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

She replaces C. Judson King, who is retiring from the post of provost after eight years.