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Georgina M. Smith Award

The American Association of University Professors invites nominations for the Georgina M. Smith Award, which was established in 1979 to honor the memory of an AAUP leader, Professor Georgina M. Smith (Mathematics, Rutgers), who was a committed feminist and a strong supporter of her local faculty union. The award, in the form of a certificate of recognition, will be presented at the AAUP Conference and Biennial Meeting, which occurs in even numbered years, to a person who has provided exceptional leadership in a given year in improving the status of academic women or in academic collective bargaining and through that work has improved the profession in general. The winner receives a monetary award in the amount of $500, which may be split among multiple winners. 

Rather than awarding such recognition annually, the Association will reserve the distinction for those occasions when some accomplishment in either area is defined as so outstanding as to merit being specially singled out. 

Please contact Monica Owens for more information.

Recipients of the Georgina Smith Award

1979Mary W. Gray, American University
1980Marilyn Sternberg, Adelphi University
1983Belle Zeller, Hunter College and Professional Staff Congress
1984Anna Penck, Western Oregon University
1985Ruth Weyand, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
1986Ralph S. Brown, Yale University
1990Dahlia Rudavsky, Shilepsky, Messing & Rudavsky
1992Bernice Resnick Sandler, Center for women Policy Studies
1993Cecile Pillsbury, University of Wisconsin
1994Ellen J. Vargyas, National Women’s Law Center
1995Barbara R. Bergman, American University
1997Dorothy Kovacevich, Kent State University
1998Carole O’Neill, Emerson College
2000Maita Levine, University of Cincinnati
2002Keith Hoeller, Washington Part-Time Faculty Association
2003Eileen Burchell, Marymount Chapter
2004Linda Backus, University of Vermont
Margaret Quan, Diablo Valley College
2007Dr. Lillian Taiz, president of the California Faculty Association and AAUP member from California State University-Los Angeles
2008Candace Kant, College of Southern Nevada
2012  Sara Kilpatrick, executive director of the Ohio AAUP conference, and Deborah Herman, executive director of the University of Cincinnati AAUP chapter
2014Mary King, Portland State University
2015Barbara Hopkins,  Wright State University
2016Deepa Kumar, Rutgers University
Deanna Wood, University of New Hampshire
2017Susan Fountain, City University of New York
2018Deborah Smith, Kent State University
2019

Christine Blasey Ford, Palo Alto University
Jennifer K. Kerns, Portland State University

2020Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi, San Francisco State University
Catherine Moran, University of New Hampshire
Anne Sisson Runyan, University of Cincinnati
2022Caprice Lawless, Front Range Community College
2024Deni Galileo, University of Delaware
2026Shannon Cummins, University of Nebraska, Omaha
Belle Boggs, North Carolina State University