Outgoing Chancellor Nicholas Dirks and Chancellor-designate Carol Christ announced both the creation of two vice chancellor positions and the appointment of Rosemarie Rae as vice chancellor chief financial officer, in an email sent to campus Wednesday.
The position of vice chancellor for finance and administration had been unfilled since former Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration John Wilton resigned, effective in February 2016. According to a campuswide email sent in August 2016, administration temporarily put the search for Wilton’s replacement on hold after Dirks announced his resignation — the search was then left for Dirks’ successor.
Campus Vice Chancellor of Student Relations Scott Biddy oversaw the responsibilities of the vice chancellor of administration and finance in the interim, according to the email.
“After a lot of thought, broad consultation with the campus and Academic Senate … we have concluded that the campus would be best served if the current VC-AF portfolio were divided between finance on one hand and administration on the other,” read the email.
Rae previously served as the campus’s chief financial officer, and before coming to campus in 2014, also worked as the chief financial officer and chief administrative officer for The National Trust for Historic Preservation.
Rae earned her bachelor’s degree in accounting from Radford University, received her master’s in public administration from American University and is a doctoral candidate in organizational design at The George Washington University, according to Office of the Chief Financial Officer website.
“I am so honored to be continuing to help and serve our faculty and students, and staff — it’s a very big job, (so) it’s good to have someone who can really focus on improving performances in the administrations,” Rae said in response to the division of vice chancellor position.
Rae added in an email that in her new role she will be responsible for working with the chancellor, Academic Senate, administrative colleagues and students to develop strategies to assure UC Berkeley “not only survives, but continues to thrive into the future.”
In response to the current budget deficit, Rae said that in the the preliminary funding, over 50 percent of the target came in through revenue. According to Rae, the administration and finance office are working on strategies — such as cost saving — to create revenue, and hope to create a balance by 2020.
“(Rae) has impeccable judgment, an extraordinary work ethic and a strong commitment to our mission and values,” Biddy said. “Rosemarie has already made enormous contributions to the campus efforts to address our budget challenges and I know that we will all be well-served by having her in this important role.”
