Provost

About our Provost

Rick Oches is a higher education leader and scholar who has championed the integration of arts and sciences with professional education. He joined Suffolk in August 2024 from Bentley University, where he had served as dean of arts and sciences since 2018 and as interim provost in 2022.

In that role, he worked collaboratively with faculty and deans across disciplines to help develop new undergraduate and graduate academic programs in response to evolving student and market needs. At Bentley, a university that combines business and the arts and sciences, he worked to achieve greater integration between the two areas of study.

Oches was drawn to Suffolk University by its access and opportunity mission and commitment to inclusive education, as well as its engagement with the city of Boston and emphasis on experiential learning, career readiness, and community engagement.

Oches’ academic background is in the natural and applied sciences. While at Bentley he served as a professor of earth and environmental sciences, and as chair of the Department of Natural and Applied Sciences from 2011 to 2018.

His teaching and research interests have focused on Earth’s recent climate history and human and environmental response to past climate changes. More recently, his academic work has explored opportunities to develop students’ transdisciplinary capabilities to address sustainability challenges through the development of innovative curricula that bridge business, liberal arts, and STEM education.

Prior to Bentley, Oches served as a visiting scientist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and as associate professor in the Department of Geology and chair of the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at the University of South Florida. He received a BS in geosciences from Purdue University and his MA and PhD in geosciences from UMass.