Rose Owens-West is Director of the Region IX Equity Assistance Center (EAC) at WestEd, and is dedicated to pursuing excellence and equity in education for all students.

Throughout her professional career, Owens-West has worked with the federal Title I, Neglected and Delinquent, Indian Education, Smaller Learning Communities, and Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration programs, as well as various state-funded programs.

Her areas of expertise include school and district improvement, high school redesign, multicultural education, organizational development, parent and community engagement in education, program evaluation, qualitative research, and assessment.

Owens-West has worked with large urban districts such as the Los Angeles Unified School District, Chicago Public Schools, and St. Louis Public Schools; mid-size districts such as the Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District (CA) and East St. Louis Public Schools (IL); and numerous small rural districts throughout California and Illinois.

She has worked extensively with diverse communities, including African American, American Indian, and Southeast Asian communities.

Owens-West works on projects that address disproportionality in special education, redesigning low-performing high schools with large populations of students of color and English learners, and building the capacity of state systems of support to turn around chronically low-performing districts and schools.

Her previous projects included convening the California Superintendents' Council on Language, Culture, Poverty and Race, and serving on a statewide committee to create California's Strategic Plan to alleviate disproportionality in special education.

Her leadership role at WestEd includes serving on two agencywide committees. She is a member of the Equity Council, and since 2009 has served as chairperson of the WestEd Staff Recognition Awards Committee.

Previously at WestEd, Owens-West served as Director of the Smaller Learning Communities Technical Assistance Center, Associate Director of the California Comprehensive Center, and Co-Director of the California Multiple Pathways Feasibility Study. She has directed numerous other federal and state-funded projects at WestEd.

Prior to joining WestEd, Owens-West worked for the Title I Technical Assistance Center at RMC, assisting nine western states with Title I implementation and school improvement.

Previously, she worked at the Illinois State Board of Education, where she served as the Program Evaluation Specialist for Title I and the Neglected Delinquent programs, and assisted with the evaluation of the Migrant Education program.

Owens-West later served as Assistant to the Executive Deputy Superintendent in Illinois, staffing the Planning and Policy Committee of the State (governing) Board, representing the State Superintendent and Executive Deputy Superintendent, and monitoring the implementation of the Illinois education reform legislation.

She coordinated the Joint Committee on Minority Student Achievement and the Retention of Minority Teachers for the State of Illinois, a joint policy committee of the Illinois State Board of Education, the Illinois Community College Board, and the Illinois Board of Higher Education. As part of this work, she received National Governor's Association funding for a seminar and report on the status and needs of minority students and minority teachers.

She is one of the primary authors of the report, Multiple Pathways to Student Success: Envisioning the New California High School.

She has contributed to several other publications including: Accessing Federal Programs: A Guidebook for Charter School Operators and Developers; Schoolwide Programs: A New Outlook; Focus on School Improvement: A Planning Guide; The Accelerated Schools Resource Guide; and numerous state evaluation reports for Chapter 1 and Title I.

Owens-West began her education career as a social studies teacher and has also taught at the preschool and university levels.

She received a BA in anthropology from Rhodes College (formerly Southwestern at Memphis); an MA in anthropology from the University of Illinois at Urbana; and a doctorate in education administration and policy analysis from Stanford University, where she worked on the Accelerated Schools Project and the Pew Forum for Educational Reform.