Extension Highlights

Nancy Garrabrants to lead UMass Extension

Nancy Garrabrants, former director of the Stockbridge School at UMass Amherst, will assume her duties as the new director of UMass Extension on August 20.

In announcing the appointment June 16, Vice Provost for Outreach Sharon Fross said that Garrabrants brings considerable experience in issues that are critical to Extension stakeholders.

“Nancy is intimately familiar with the landscape of Massachusetts, with the state’s Extension programs, and with the University’s ongoing commitment as a land grant university to address the critical needs of the land, people and communities of the Commonwealth,” said Fross.

Nancy Garrabrants served as Director and Assistant Dean for UMass Amherst’s Stockbridge School from 1998 to 2006. The Stockbridge School offers programs in agriculture and natural resource management within the UMass Amherst College of Natural Resources and the Environment. She is currently a lecturer in the Plant, Soils and Insect Sciences Department of the College of Natural Resources, and has been with University of Massachusetts Amherst since 1980.

The Vice Provost noted that Garrabrants has worked with varied constituencies across the Commonwealth, including the Massachusetts Center for Career and Technical Education Steering committee, the Northeast Service Providers Consortium, the Massachusetts Flower Growers Association and the American Institute of Floral Designers. In addition, she taught horticulture at the State University of New York at Cobleskill.

She is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and earned her Master’s degree in Plant and Soil Sciences in 1987.

Garrabrants said she has always felt a deep connection to Extension’s mission and programming.

"I consider myself fortunate to be the next director of this dynamic organization,” she said. “UMass Extension has a long history of assisting families, youth, businesses and communities in improving the quality of life within our state and beyond."

The new director succeeds Robert Schrader, who has served as Interim Director for the past three years, ushering Extension through a comprehensive five-year planning process for Extension programs including Agricultural & Landscape, Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation, Nutrition Education, and 4-H.

“Nancy Garrabrants brings to her new role an ability to put that planning to work as a critical component of Outreach programming at UMass Amherst,” said Vice Provost Fross.