Sally Rockey

Sally Rockey is the Chief Executive Officer of Rockey Consulting. Rockey received her Ph.D. in Entomology from The Ohio State University and did postgraduate work at University of Wisconsin. Rockey has had a noteworthy career in leading the operations of prominent research organizations. She retired in 2022 as Executive Director of the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research, a 501(c)(3) supporting private/public partnerships that accelerate innovative research and science in agriculture.

As inaugural Executive Director, she built the organization, saw it through its startup phase and witnessed its growth into the significant force in the agriculture research community that it is today. Prior to this role, Rockey was a leader in federal research, overseeing the administration of extramural programs in both agriculture and biomedicine. She spent almost twenty years with the U.S. Department of Agriculture where she held several positions within the Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (now the National Institute of Food and Agriculture).

From there she spent eleven years with the National Institutes of Health as NIH Deputy Director for Extramural Research where she led the research administration of the world’s largest extramural research program.

Currently, Rockey serves as Vice Chair of the Board of Directors of the Boyce Thompson Institute and is a member of the Dean’s Advisory Committee of the College of Arts and Sciences at The Ohio State University and the Board of Trustees of the American Society of Nutrition Foundation.