Dr. Barbara Illowsky is currently Chief Academic Affairs Officer for the California Community Colleges Online Education Initiative. In this role, Barbara oversees integration of academic support services, including tutoring, proctoring, plagiarism detection, accessibility support and Open Educational Resources into online learning courses. In addition, Barbara has been a mathematics and statistics professor at De Anza College, Cupertino, CA since 1989. She was a board member of the California Mathematics Council, Community Colleges (CMC3) for 18 years, including as president. Dr. Illowsky spent two years, 2012 – 2014, at the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office overseeing the Basic Skills Initiative, Middle College High School grants, as well as writing OER policy.
Barbara is co-author of “Collaborative Statistics” and “Introductory Statistics”, free and open textbooks published by OpenStax College that are used by hundreds of colleges, universities, and high schools throughout the country and world. Barbara is considered one of the leading international experts in open educational resources. In 2013, the Open Education Consortium awarded her its top international award, the Educator ACE Award, for her contributions worldwide in promoting, training, authoring, and advocating for Open Educational Resources. She now serves on the international Board of Directors for the Open Education Consortium. Dr. Illowsky earned her BS in Mathematics from SUNY Albany, her MA in Statistics from Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania and her PhD in Education: Instructional Design for Online Learning from Capella University.
