UC Davis Professor M.R.C. Greenwood, former provost of the UC system, has been named president of the 10-campus University of Hawaii, with nearly 55,000 graduate and undergraduate students.

The UH Board of Regents approved Greenwood’s hiring on June 10, voting 12-0 to give her a three-year appointment with two annual renewal options, beginning no later than Aug. 24.

One of her chancellors in the UH system is Virginia Hinshaw, former UC Davis provost, who leads the flagship University of Hawaii-Manoa. The UH system includes two other university campuses, seven community colleges, and dozens of educational, training and research centers across the Hawaiian Islands.

UC Davis Chancellor Larry Vanderhoef, who observed Greenwood’s rise from UC Davis administrator to UC Santa Cruz chancellor to the systemwide provost’s office, said she and the presidency of the University of Hawaii are “a great match.”

“She understands how university systems work, both from the perspective of a campus chancellor and from the president’s office,” Vanderhoef said. “She is innovative about all aspects of higher education and research, and, as a member of the Institute of Medicine, has instant credibility as an academic. She will serve the University of Hawaii well.”

As she leaves UC and its budget crisis, she goes to a university with a budget crisis of its own: a $148 million shortfall over the next two years, according to The Honolulu Advertiser newspaper.

“I know that this is going to be a painful time for the university and we will work together to try to determine what the deepest priorities of the university are and how we will handle it,” Greenwood said from UC Davis, in a teleconference with the Hawaiian media after her appointment.

Greenwood joined the UC Davis faculty in 1989, becoming a distinguished professor of nutrition and internal medicine. She also served as vice provost of academic outreach and dean of graduate studies.

She left in 1996 to become chancellor of UC Santa Cruz and went from there to UC headquarters in Oakland in April 2004, serving as the UC system’s first female provost—the highest-ranking academic officer in the UC system. She also held the title senior vice president for Academic Affairs.

Greenwood resigned in November 2005 amid an investigation into possible improper hirings and conflict of interest. UC looked into the hiring of two people:

• Her son, James Greenwood, as a paid senior intern in Student Affairs at UC Merced. The UC auditor subsequently ruled that M.R.C. Greenwood had no involvement in her son’s hiring.

• Her friend and business partner Lynda Goff, as a faculty associate and then as director of UC’s Science and Math Initiative. The UC Office of the General Counsel concluded that Greenwood should not have participated in decisions regarding Goff’s employment.

A summary of her public interview with the University of Hawaii presidential selection committee indicates that she apologized for “the inadvertent mistake,” and that UC General Counsel James Holst, who has since retired, told the committee: “The employment processes involved isolated circumstances; at no point in her university service was there any pattern of impropriety or ethical lapses.”

The summary also notes that Robert Dynes, UC’s president at the time, told the committee that he did not ask Greenwood for her resignation or pressure her to resign. Greenwood told the committee that she resigned "because I believed it was the honorable thing to do and I could no longer work with the president,"  according to the final report of the presidential selection committee.

On April 1, 2006, Greenwood returned to UC Davis, where she rejoined the Department of Nutrition and became chair of the Graduate Group in Nutritional Biology and director of the Foods for Health Institute.

She lists her research interests as national science policy, obesity, diabetes and women’s health. Her past work focused on the role of genetics in the development of obesity and diabetes, bringing her to international prominence in the field.

Today, she also is interested in national and international policy in these areas, and the role of government in the regulation of food and diet.

In a news release, University of Hawaii Board of Regents Chair Allan Landon described Greenwood as “a great scholar with an excellent research reputation.”

She will succeed David McClain, who is stepping down in July after five years as the UH president and plans to rejoin the faculty at the Shidler College of Business at UH-Manoa, after taking a one-year sabbatical.

In a statement, McClain praised Greenwood as “a brilliant, internationally recognized scholar and a proven and transformational academic leader,” and he pledged his full support to ensure a smooth transition.

The UH Board of Regents set Greenwood’s salary at $475,008 annually, with a notation that Greenwood offered to accept a pay cut consistent with other University of Hawaii administrative officers. McClain is being paid $414,096 as president.