Dr. Rich Bonanno
Vice Provost for Outreach and Engagement
120 Patterson Hall, Box 7602
Bio
Dr. Rich Bonanno serves as Vice Provost for Outreach and Engagement at NC State University. In this role, Bonanno works with Outreach and Engagement staff, the Engagement Operations Council and other key community partners, faculty and staff to support the unit’s mission and vision and to help achieve strategic goals. Bonanno also serves as associate dean and director of NC State Extension in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and as a professor of horticulture in the Department of Horticultural Science.
Prior to joining the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences in 2016, Bonanno was an extension educator and adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts. He is owner of Pleasant Valley Gardens, a family farm started in 1910. He currently serves as chair of the Association of Southern Region Extension Directors, and is a board member of the National Coalition for Food and Agricultural Research, the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities Committee on Legislation and Policy and the APLU Extension Committee on Policy.
He is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society of Horticultural Science, the Council for Agricultural Science and Technology and Sigma Xi. Bonanno is both a member and fellow of the Northeastern Weed Science Society and the Weed Science Society of North America.
Bonanno received a Bachelor of Science in agronomy, along with a Master of Science in vegetable crops/weed science from Cornell University, and a Ph.D. in horticulture/physiology from Oregon State University.