The University of California Board of Regents appointed UC San Diego alumnus Katherine Newman as University of California provost and executive vice president for academic affairs on Tuesday.

Newman is currently the system chancellor for academic programs and senior vice president for economic development in the Office of the President at the University of Massachusetts. She will take over the position Jan. 9, according to a UC press release. Her appointment will replace Michael Brown, who is retiring from the position after five years in December.

The provost and executive vice president for academic affairs directs UC policy developments, oversees academic planning and works with the UC Academic Senate and other academic leaders, according to the UC Office of the President.

“(Newman) is a talented academic leader who cares deeply about public high education and the vital role it plays in helping communities thrive,” said UC President Michael Drake in the press release. “I look forward to working with her to advance our shared academic priorities, including the important work underway to close equity gaps across the University of California and to diversify our professoriate.”

Newman also received her doctoral degree from UC Berkeley and taught in the jurisprudence and social policy program at UC Berkeley School of Law.

She has additionally held the positions of director of the Institute of International and Regional Studies at Princeton University, founding dean of social science at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University and provost at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, according to the press release.

President Drake chose Newman as candidate for provost after discussion with a UC-wide advisory committee made up of faculty, students, staff and other senior officials, according to the press release.

“It is the honor of a lifetime to return to the University of California, my alma mater twice over,” Newman said in the press release. “Its excellence in all spheres – from its remarkable faculty to its extraordinary students – is recognized the world over.”