Dr. Risco received his DVM degree in 1980 from the University of Florida and advanced clinical training as an intern in private dairy practice at the Chino Valley Veterinary Associates, Ontario, California.

He is a diplomate in the American College of Theriogenologists. He became full Professor in 2002, was Chair of the Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences from 2012 to 2018, and named Professor Emeritus in 2018.

He is currently Dean of the Oklahoma State University, College of Veterinary Medicine. Dr. Risco has 90 refereed publications, 32 proceeding articles, 12 book chapters, edited the textbook Dairy Production Medicine (2011) published by Wiley – Blackwell that is available in English and Japanese, and the Herd Health Section for the Large Dairy Herd Management textbook published by the American Dairy Science Association in 2017.

According to Research.com 2022, Dr. Risco has a Discipline H-1 Index of 46 with 7.586 citations. Dr. Risco has given more than 100 presentations nationally and internationally.