Nancy Owen
Nancy Owen is a Fellow of the Institute for Learning at the University of Pittsburgh. Nancy is a member of the Disciplinary Literacy Team and works with the K-12 ELA strand. In addition, she has most recently conducted leadership development seminars in Dallas, Ft. Worth, Grand Rapids and Wilson (PA) School Districts.
Owen retired from the Providence School District where she worked for 31 years. She was the Principal of a redesigned High School in Providence, Rhode Island. Owen was Providence's first administrator to facilitate a Site-based Managed School on the elementary level and had successfully gained the designation for Providence's first Site-based Managed High School. Owen has written, received and coordinated multiple grants for her school including a Disney Learning Partnership Grant, Comprehensive School Reform Grant, Magnet Schools Grant, Virtual Professional Development Schools Grant and Children's Crusade Grant in her elementary school. Her high school was recipient of a Carnegie Foundation Grant, New England Small Schools Network Grant, a Perkins Grant, and a Rhode Island School to Careers Grant. Owen was a Mentor Principal and worked with aspiring principals within her district. She received the title of Master Principal and served as Leadership Advisor to the Superintendent. As a Reading Specialist, she conducted city-wide professional development focused on literacy improvement.
She has participated in a think tank funded by the Wallace-Reader's Digest Foundation and the Institute for Learning. Owen served as core group member of the MacArthur Research Network on Teaching and Learning for six years. During that time the network focused on analyzing the reasons for the slow and uneven pace of education reform and examining improvements in teaching and learning.