Rose Wong

The Oregonian/Oregon Live

Reporter Profile

Rose Wong covers early childhood education for The Oregonian/OregonLive in Portland. Wong graduated from Duke University, where she was senior editor of the student paper, The Chronicle. In 2020, she won top honors in the university’s Melcher Family Award for Excellence in Student Journalism, which recognized her series exposing a pattern of misdiagnoses and inadequate care at the Duke Student Health Center. The reported columns and Wong’s personal story of misdiagnosis were recognized in a Washington Post investigation on college health centers across the country. As a college intern for the Tampa Bay Times, Wong covered breaking news, while reporting on the outbreak of COVID-19 cases in the region’s nursing homes and the operational failures that enabled it. Wong speaks fluent Cantonese and Mandarin, and is from Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

Beat: Early childhood education

This reporter takes a hard look at preschool programs to see what’s working and what funding levers or other regulatory mechanisms are being squandered. That’s essential because most brain development occurs before age 5 – and also because Oregon is poised to pump tens of millions of new dollars into early childhood programs. The reporter also focuses on kindergarten through grade three, particularly early literacy instruction and social-emotional learning. And they'll assess the strengths and weaknesses of teacher preparation, teacher training and instructional techniques for Oregon’s early elementary educators.