Kate Venturini Hardesty

  • Program Administrator, Extension Educator
  • Cooperative Extension
  • Phone: 401.874.4096
  • Email: keventurini@uri.edu
  • Office Location: Kathleen M. Mallon Outreach Center, 3 East Alumni Avenue, Kingston RI 02881
  • Website

Biography

Kate Venturini Hardesty is a program administrator and educator for Cooperative Extension at the University of Rhode Island, where she provides leadership to several programs and initiatives around critical issues including energy, food and consumer environmental literacy. She is responsible for oversight of experiential learning programs for students, train the trainer programs for early adopters and educational trainings for professionals, and works with academic faculty, staff and students, governmental, business and nonprofit professionals, and hundreds of volunteers to effect change around environmental, economic and social issues relevant to Rhode Islanders. Kate has expertise and a passion for functional landscape design, native plants and their role in preserving biodiversity on the landscape, residential stormwater management for water quality protection and environmental education. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Landscape Architecture and Master of Arts in Marine Affairs, both from URI.

Affiliated Programs 

  1. AgriProspects Workforce Development Network – Northeast Region Content Coordinator
  2. Agriculture and Food Systems Fellowship Program
  3. Energy Fellows Program
  4. Energy Literacy Initiative / Plugged into Energy Research lectures series
  5. Home Horticulture Certificate
  6. Invasive Plant Management Trainings
  7. Master Gardener Program