Julie E. Owen

Julie E. Owen

Julie E. Owen

Associate Professor

the intersections of leadership identity and women’s adult development, critical and emancipatory research methods, the scholarship of liberatory leadership teaching and learning.

Dr. Julie E. Owen is an Associate Professor of Leadership Studies at the School of Integrative Studies, George Mason University, where she coordinates the leadership studies major and minor, and teaches interdisciplinary courses on socially-responsible leadership, civic engagement, higher education, and community-engaged research. She is a Senior Scholar for Mason’s Center for the Advancement of Well-Being and serves as Faculty Associate for the Center for Community Engagement and Civic Leadership (CECiL). She is affiliate faculty with the Higher Education Program, and with Women and Gender Studies.

Owen is author of We are the Leaders We've Been Waiting For: Women and Leadership Development in College (Stylus, 2020), co-editor of Women and Leadership in College: A Facilitation Guide (Stylus, 2021) and the Handbook for Student Leadership Development (Jossey-Bass), and editor of the inaugural edition of New Directions for Student Leadership (Jossey-Bass). She serves on several research teams, including the Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership – Institutional Survey (MSL-IS) and the Leadership Identity Development (LID) project. Owen has received grants from the Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education (CAS) and received AAC&U Bringing Theory to Practice (BTtP) research grant to examine the effects of civic engagement and well-being on first generation college students. She is a frequent presenter, consultant, and keynote speaker on topics related to leadership, social change, and organizational development.

In addition to assuming leadership roles in professional associations including ACPA: College Educators International and the International Leadership Association (ILA), Owen has received AAC&U’s K. Patricia Cross Future Leaders Award and ACPA’s Annuit Coeptis and Diamond Honoree awards, and NASPA's Ruth Strang Research Award which recognizes a scholar for their outstanding contributions to the body of knowledge about women and gender in higher education. At Mason, she was honored with the Teaching Excellence Award, the Undergraduate Research Mentoring Excellence Award, and was named Engaged Faculty Member of the Year for 2018. She was recognized with NASPA’s SLPKC Komives Research Award and the University of Maryland’s Distinguished Alumni Magoon Award.

Owen received her B.A. degree (1993) in psychology and English from the College of William and Mary, and her M. Ed. (1996) in College Student Personnel Administration from James Madison University. She holds a certificate of non-profit administration from Duke University (2000) and received her PhD (2008) in college student personnel at the University of Maryland, College Park.  She resides in Fairfax, Virginia, where she enjoys reading, gardening, and travel.

 

Current Research

A Research Agenda for Leadership Learning and Development Through Higher Education

Developing a volume that examines explicit and implicit agendas for leadership education, interrogates existing theory and research on leadership education, and provides a rationale for centering the future of leadership development in equity and social justice. 

Narratives of Women and Leadership

This multi-site collaborative qualitative research project gathers a multitude of women's stories in their leadership learning journeys, in their own words, grounded in narrative (Bloom, 1998; Clandinin & Connelly, 2000; Riessman, 2008), storytelling and counter-storytelling (Clandinin  & Connelly, 2000; Delgado, 1989; Solorzano & Yosso, 2001), and testimonio methodologies (Delgado Bernal et al., 2012; Perez Huber, 2008, 2009). These narratives act as artifacts of truths for the multiplicities of leadership development intertwined with salient intersectional identities, experiences navigating oppression and privilege in systems, and the unique and complex stories of women as leaders and change agents in their families and communities.

Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership: Institutional Survey  www.leadershipstudy.net

The Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership (MSL) is an annual, national survey of leadership development among college students. It explores the role of higher education in developing leadership capacities with a special focus on specific environmental conditions that foster leadership development.

Leadership Identity Development (LID) Project

A grounded theory project examining the development on non-hierarchical leadership in college students. Current research involves examining ways scholars and educators are taking a lifespan approach to leader/leadership identity development including looking at youth, young adult, and post-college leadership development. A forthcoming volume names gaps and omissions in existing literature and interrogates leadership education’s traditional marginalization of issues related to identity, equity and power.

Selected Publications

Books and Edited Volumes:

Owen, J. E. (Ed.) (Under contract for 2023). Leadership Identity Development. New Directions for Student Leadership Vol. 178. Wiley.

Komives, S. R. & Owen J.E. (Under contract for 2023). A Research Agenda for Leadership Development Through Higher Education. Cheltenham, UK: Elgar Publishing.

Pigza, J., Owen, J. E., & Associates (2021).  Women and Leadership in College: A Facilitation Guide. Stylus Publishing.

Owen, J. E. (2020). We are the Leaders We’ve Been Waiting For: Women and Leadership Development in College. Stylus.

Owen, J. E. (Ed.). (2015). Innovative learning for leadership development. New Directions for Student Leadership Vol. 145. Jossey-Bass.

学生领导力发展手册 (Handbook for student leadership development). (2015). Chinese translation. Peking University Press.

Komives, S. R., Dugan, J., Owen, J. E., Slack, C., & Wagner, W. (Eds). (2011). The handbook for student leadership development [2nd edition]. Jossey-Bass.

 

Refereed Journal Articles:

Owen, J. E., McCarron, G., & Chen, C. (2022). “Never ‘because of’, always ‘in spite of’”:Implications of the Culturally-Relevant Leadership Learning Model for student social justice activists’ leadership learning. Journal of Leadership Studies.  

Owen, J. E., Rigaud, S., & McCarron, G. (2021). Hidden costs and commitments: Leadership, social class, and experiential learning. New Directions for Student Leadership, 169, 103-110. https://doi.org/10.1002/yd.20426

Beatty, C. C., Irwin, L., Owen, J. E., Tapia-Fuselier, N., Guthrie, K., Cohen-Derr, E., Hassell-Goodman, S., Rocco, M., & Yamanaka, A. (2020). A call for centering social identities in the National Leadership Education Research Agenda. Journal of Leadership Studies. DOI: 10.1002/jls.21719

Owen, J. E., Krell, M. R., & McCarron, G. P. (2019). An exploration of civic identity in first-generation college students: Charity to solidarity. Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, 56 (5), 535-549. DOI: 10.1080/19496591.2019.1648275

Odum, S., Dunn, A., & Owen, J. (2019). Using social media in the classroom to engage learners in developing as leaders: The personal leadership experiment. Journal of Leadership Education, 10 (18).  DOI: 10.12806/V18/I3/A3

 Owen, J., Hassell-Goodman, S., & Yamanaka, A. (2017). Culturally-relevant leadership learning: Identity, capacity, and efficacy. Journal of Leadership Studies, 11 (3), 48-54. DOI: 10.1002/jls.21545

Hutnick, C., Galloway, K., Joyner, D., Owen, J. E., & Scott Constantine, S.  (2017). Creative leadership as social action and transformation. Journal of Leadership Studies, 11 (1), 52-58.

Jenkins, D., & Owen, J. E. (2016). Who teaches leadership? A comparative analysis of faculty and student affairs leadership educators and implications for leadership learning. Journal of Leadership Education, 15 (2), 98-113.

Owen, J.E. (2016). Fostering critical reflection: Moving from a service to a social justice paradigm.  New Directions for Student Leadership, 6, 37-48.  DOI: 10.1002/yd.20169

 

Chapters in Edited Books:

Owen, J. E. & Bitton, A. (2023). Narratives of socialization and liberation: The Development of Feminist Leadership Identities. In T. Teig, B. Devies, & R. Shetty (Eds.) Women’s Narratives of Leadership Learning. Information Age Press.

Owen, J.E. (2022). What can we do to support college students? In Y. Gulley (Ed.), Multiple Perspectives on Today’s College Students. Routledge.

Devies, B., & Owen, J.E. (2022). Cultivating a systems mindset through feminist leadership (pp. 175-183). In K. Priest & K. Guthrie (Eds.), Navigating Complexities in Leadership: Moving Towards Critical Hope. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.

 Owen, J. (2021). Curricular applications of the culturally-relevant leadership learning model. In C. Beatty & K. Guthrie (Eds.), Operationalizing the Culturally Relevant Leadership Learning Model. Information Age Publishing.

 Owen, J. E., Devies, B., & Reynolds, D. (2021). Going beyond ‘add women and stir’: Fostering feminist leadership. In K. Guthrie & V. Chunoo (Eds.), Shifting the Mindset: Socially Just Leadership Education. Information Age Publishing.

 Owen, J. E. (2020). Follow the Leader or Leading the Follower?: Asking Critical Questions About Followers and Followership. In K. Guthrie & D. Jenkins (Eds.), Transforming Learning: Instructional and Assessment Strategies for Leadership Education. Information Age Publishing.

 Owen, J. E. (2019). Personal Narratives as Authentic Expression. In J. M. Volpe White, K. L. Guthrie, & M. Torres (Eds.), Thinking to Transform: Reflection in leadership learning. Information Age Publishing.

 Owen, J. E., Mahatmya, D., and Carter, R. (April, 2017). The Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, Conscientiousness (DISC) Assessment Tool. In V. Zeigler-Hill & T. Shackelford (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. New York: Springer. 

 Mahatmya, D., Owen, J. E., & Carter, R. (May, 2016). Civic involvement. In Levesque, R. (Ed.),  Encyclopedia of Adolescence (pp. 1-7). New York: Springer.  

Grants and Fellowships

Career Development Faculty Development Research Award (FDRA) (2021)

Recipient of a competitive award to provide research and professional development support to enhance the career development of mid-career faculty pursuing promotion to full professor.

Provost’s Curriculum Impact Grants (CIGs) (2019)

Member of the team that received competitive internal grant to develop a four-year developmental Bonner Leadership Program at Mason. The Bonner Program seeks to provide diverse, predominantly low-income students with access to education and opportunities to serve the community.

Bringing Theory to Practice Research Grant (Association of American Colleges & Universities (2015-2018)

Principal Investigator. Recipient of competitive research grant titled “Thriving Together: Leveraging Well-Being and Civic Engagement as Pathways to Flourishing for First Generation College Students”.

Council for the Advancement of Higher Education (CAS) Research Grant 

Principal Investigator. Recipient of competitive research grant to quantitatively assess the extent to which each of the thirteen component parts of the CAS standards for Student Leadership Programs (SLPs) predict leadership outcomes related to social change and leadership efficacy at over 100 institutions of higher education. 

Courses Taught

INTS 204 Leadership Theory & Practice

INTS 405 Women and Leadership

INTS 435/535 Leading Change

INTS 434/534  Research Methods for Social Change

HE 646 Student Development Theory

HE 810 Leadership in Higher Education

PROV 701 Preparing for Careers in the Academy

Education

Ph.D. Counseling & Personnel Services, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland

M. Ed. College Student Personnel Administration, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, Virginia

Certificate of Non-Profit Administration, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina

B.A. Psychology and English Literature, The College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia

 

Recent Presentations

Refereed Conference Presentations (selected):

Owen, J., Chunoo, V., McKenzie, B., Odom, S., Rocco, M., & Yamanaka, A. (October, 2022). A Complicit Omission? Issues of Equity, Identity, and Power in Leadership Development. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Washington, DC.

DeFrank-Cole, L., Owen, J., Pigza, J., & Tan, S. (October, 2022). Women, Gender, and Leadership: Critical Conversations on Terminology and Inclusion. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Washington, DC.

Skendall, K., Dugan, J., Jabaji, R., Owen, J., & Pierre, D. (October, 2022). Personality is not Performance: Leveraging Research-Based Assessments to Drive Impact. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Washington, DC.

McCain, K., Owen, J., Rocco, M., Sunderman, H., Veach, P., & Youngblood, R.J. (October, 2022). Reimagining Leader(ship) Identity Development of Womxn. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Washington, DC.

Owen, J., Chunoo, V., Hastings, L., Johnson, M., Komives, S., Satterwhite, R. & Yamanaka, A. (October 2022). A Research Agenda for Leadership Learning and Development Through Higher Education. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Washington, DC.

Devies, B., Owen, J., & Guthrie, K. (October, 2021).  Cultivating a Systems Mindset through Feminist Leadership. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Geneva, Switzerland [virtual].

Owen, J., Bitton, A., Hassell-Goodman, S., Reynolds, D., & Yamanaka, A. (December 2020). We’re the Leaders We’ve Been Waiting For: Reimagining Women and Leadership. Presentation at the Leadership Educators Institute. New Orleans, LA [virtual].

Devies, B., Reynolds, D., & Owen, J. (December 2020). A Feminist Examination of the Culturally Relevant Leadership Learning Model. Presentation at the Leadership Educator’s Institute. New Orleans, LA [virtual].

 Barnes, A., Haber-Curran, P., & Owen, J. (December 2020). Critical Perspectives of Women & Leadership Development in College: Tools for Facilitating Student Learning & Development. Presentation at the Leadership Educator’s Institute. New Orleans, LA [virtual].

 Owen, J., Bitton, A., Hassell-Goodman, S., Reynolds, D., & Yamanaka, A. (March 2020). We’re the Leaders We’ve Been Waiting For: Reimagining Women and Leadership. Presentation at the American College Personnel Association Annual Conference. Nashville, TN.

 Owen, J., Pigza, J., & Yamanaka, A. (November 2019). Counter-Narratives and Courageous Conversations: Using Autoethnography in Leadership Education. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Ottawa, Canada.

Friesen, K., Adenoro, T., Beatty, C., Hastings, L., & Owen, J. (November 2019). Exploring Scholarship at the Interdisciplinary Nexus of Leadership Education and Development. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Ottawa, Canada.

 Rocco, M. & Owen, J. (November 2019). Exploring and Advancing the Leadership Identity Development Model: Applications from Current Research. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Ottawa, Canada.

 Owen, J., Guthrie, K., Haber Curran, P., Komives, S., Pigza, J., Rocco, M., & Yamanaka, A. (December 2018). Women's Leadership Development on College Campuses: Progress and Perspectives. Presentation at the Leadership Educator’s Institute. Orlando, FL.

Yamanaka, A., Hassell-Goodman, S., Chunoo, V., Guthrie, K. & Owen, J. (December 2018). Culturally Relevant Leadership Learning: Student Identity, Capacity, and Efficacy Development. Presentation at the Leadership Educator’s Institute. Orlando, FL.

Cohen Derr, E., Rocco, M., Komives, S. & Owen, J. (December 2018). Advancing the Leadership Identity Development Model: Insights and Applications from Current Research. Presentation at the Leadership Educator’s Institute. Orlando, FL.

 Owen, J., Guthrie, K., Haber Curran, P., Komives, S., Rocco, M., Yamanaka, A., & Youngblood, R.J. (October 2018). Women's Leadership Development on College Campuses: Progress and Perspectives. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Palm Beach, FL.

 Owen, J. [Chair] (October 2018). Researching Leadership Education: Constructing Critical Competencies. Presentation at the International Leadership Association Annual Meeting. Palm Beach, FL.

 

In the Media

NASPA Leadership Podcast (October 2021). Shifting the Mindset: Fostering Feminist Leadership. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/socially-just-and-culturally-relevant-leadership/id1118539788?i=1000539069103

Student Affairs NOW Podcast (December 2020). We are the Leaders We’ve Been Waiting For: Reimagining Women and Leadership. https://studentaffairsnow.com/we-are-the-leaders/

Invited Author (November 2020). We are the Leaders We’ve Been Waiting For: Reimagining Women and Leadership. Fall for the Book Literary Festival. Fairfax, VA.

https://fallforthebook.org/julieowen/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHhmK2IDAqE&t=2879s

SACSA Podcast (October 2020). Pulling Back the Curtain: Faculty Experiences During Covid. https://open.spotify.com/episode/5lsZgo0lpBTmKMnH8RakI8

Leadership Educator’s Podcast (July 2020). https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-9grae-e92f2e?utm_campaign=u_share_ep&utm_medium=dlink&utm_source=u_share

Phronesis Podcast (June 2020). https://www.buzzsprout.com/979897

NASPA Leadership Podcast (June 2020). Women and Leadership (Pt. 1-3).  [1800+ downloads]

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745/ep-73-women-and-leadership-part-i

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745/episode-74-women-and-leadership-series-part-2-the-power-of-story-in-leadership-development

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745/episode-3-women-and-leadership-development-in-college-a-facilitation-resource

NASPA Leadership Podcast (December 2017). Leadership Education: The Year in Review.

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745/episode-39-review-of-leadership-in-2017-with-dr-sherry-watt-dr-julie-owen-and-dr-john-dugan

Selected Presenter @ TEDx Mason (September 2017). Does Who You Are Affect How You Lead? The Roles of Identity, Capacity, and Efficacy in Leadership. Fairfax, VA.

NASPA Leadership Podcast (August 2017). The Role of Power & Authority in Leadership.

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745

NASPA Leadership Podcast (February 2017). Leadership Education’s Third Wave.

https://soundcloud.com/user-606900324-709612745

Dissertations Supervised Outside of CHSS

Natoya Walker-Minor, University of Charleston, Doctorate of Executive Leadership Program,

School of Business and Leadership, April 2022, A Narrative Study of Leaders and Vulnerability

Jennifer Murphy, University of Charleston, Doctorate of Executive Leadership Program, School of Business and Leadership, April 2021

CONSTRUCTING A THEORY OF THE COEVOLUTION OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS AND THE EASTERN ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM

Steve Mencarini, University of North Carolina Greensboro, September 2018

A Longitudinal Examination of Structural Environments Within U.S. College and University Leadership Development Programs.

Meghan Hennessey, CEHD, George Mason University, August 2018

FACULTY LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT IN PROFESSIONAL MILITARY EDUCATION

Erika Cohen Derr, Georgetown University, April 2018

BEYOND DEPENDENT AND INDEPENDENT: LEADERSHIP IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT IN AN ACHIEVEMENT-ORIENTED CONTEXT 

Bruce R. Perry, University of Massachusetts Boston, March 2018

A CASE STUDY OF CO-CURRICULAR PORTFOLIOS

Melissa Rocco, University of Maryland College Park, May 2017

MOVING BEYOND COMMON PARADIGMS OF LEADERSHIP: UNDERSTANDING THE DEVELOPMENT OF ADVANCED LEADERSHIP IDENTITY

Ben Correia, Loyola University Chicago, Higher Education Program, September 2016

THE ROLE OF MOTIVATION IN COLLEGE STUDENT LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT