Awards

See past awardees below the call for nominations

2022 CESJ Call for Award Nominations

Call for Nominations: Outstanding Dissertation Award

Deadline extended to January 7!

Award Description:
This award recognizes doctoral-level research that utilizes critical theory and critical methodologies (submissions with critical qualitative, Indigenous and critical quantitative methods are encouraged). Dissertations must focus on the struggle for social, environmental, racial, linguistic and economic justice.

If you have a bi/multilingual dissertation or a dissertation in languages Othered by English please contact the dissertation Chair. We can currently accommodate the following languages: Arabic, Spanish, Korean, German and Mandarin. We will try our best to find reviewers who can attend to the named language of your dissertation study.

Eligibility Requirements:
Nominees must have successfully defended their dissertation between Spring 2018 and Fall 2021.

Submission Requirements:

A nomination letter including name, title, institution, mailing address, phone number, and email address (Self-nominations are acceptable).
Memo: A maximum of three page single-spaced memo without identifiable (information) written by the applicant describing how each of the following dissertation elements connects to and weaves with CESJ's Mission:
- Research Axiology: What sort of value systems have you inherited that shape how you view your relationship with your dissertation research, your research participants, and what is your "responsibility" towards these relationships in your research (Wilson, 2008, p. 77)?;
- A statement about the questions, stories, poems, wisdoms, spiritualities, or problems that guided the dissertation research;
- Theoretical framework;
- Research methodology;
- Indicate limitations and challenges that impacted your dissertation research (could be personal and/or professional). How well you were supported in your PhD program;
- Findings;
- Implications for future research, policy, and/or practice

A 15-20 page synopsis of the dissertation (double-spaced, not including references, tables, and appendices). The applicant must remove all identifiable references to individuals, institutions, and places that might bias reviewers. This synopsis can be written in journal manuscript format (if you choose to). We would encourage this format if you’d like to work your proposal towards a future publication.

All materials should be submitted no later than 11:59 PM PST on January 7, 2022.

Please reach out to the Outstanding Dissertation Award Co-Chairs, Youmna Deiri youmna.deiri@tamiu.edu and Tanja Burkhard at tanja.burkhard@wsu.edu for questions.

If you have a video or audio based dissertation, please contact the dissertation award chair to discuss submission modifications.

CESJ Scholar-Activist Award (Due Jan. 7)
The CESJ Scholar-Activist Award recognizes a scholar-activist (any rank) who has made significant contributions to the promotion of social, environmental, and/or economic justice (e.g., racial, disability, queer, trans, immigrant), or human rights through research and scholarship collaboration(s) with community partners, artists, or cultural, grassroots, and/or social movement groups. To view requirements, visit this link.
All materials should be submitted using this form no later than 11:59 PM PST on January 7, 2022. If you have questions, please reach out to the Scholar-Activist Award Chair, Shanyce Campbell at shanycecampbell@pitt.edu.

Revolutionary Mentor Award (Due Jan 7)
The Critical Educators for Social Justice SIG Revolutionary Mentor Award honors a scholar (at any rank) who has been vital in supporting others in their research, teaching, and critical community engagement. This award highlights scholars who encourage, support and collaborate with graduate students and junior faculty to cultivate transformative scholarship that impacts communities inside and outside of the academy. For more information about the award or to submit a nomination please go to this link: https://forms.gle/8tMDXcviKzy7WQRP7
All nomination packages due by Friday, January 7th @ 11:59 pm/pst. Contact, Aja D. Reynolds, PhD @ areyno35@wayne.edu with questions or concerns.

2021 CESJ Award Winners

Dissertation Award Winner:
Dr. Martín Alberto Gonzalez
Dissertation Title: ‘Why you always so political?’: The Experiences and Resiliencies of Mexican/Mexican American/Xicanx Students at a Predominantly White University
Degree Granting Institution: Syracuse University

Dissertation Award Finalist:
Dr. Sharim Hannegan-Martinez
Dissertation Title: Literacies of Love:
Trauma, Healing and Pedagogical Shifts in an English Classroom
Degree Granting Institution: University of California, Los Angeles

Dissertation Award Finalist:
Dr. Ashley Smith-Purviance
Dissertation Title: Everyday Anti-Black Girl Violence: Surviving and Learning Amidst Persistent
School Violence Against Middle School Black Girls
Degree Granting Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison

Dissertation Award Finalist:
Dr. Dinorah Sánchez Loza
Dissertation Title: Reading, Writing, and Right-Wing (Re)Production: The Teaching and Learning of Settler Citizenship in Ohio
Degree Granting Institution: University of California, Berkeley

Dissertation Award Honorable Mention:
Dr. Oscar E. Patrón
Dissertation Title: Reconceptualizing Notions of Resilience Through the Experiences of Gay Latino Male Collegians
Degree Granting Institution: University of Pittsburgh

2020 CESJ Award Winners

Outstanding Dissertation Awardee:
Dr. Yuliana Kenfield
Dissertation Title: Decolonial Sociolinguistics Gestures Of Andean Quechua-Spanish Bilingual College Students Promoting Quechua
Graduate of the University of New Mexico
Assistant Professor, University of Texas Permian Basin

Outstanding Dissertation Semifinalist:
Dr. Meredith McCoy
Dissertation Title:
A Critical Race Theory Analysis of Settler Colonial Structures and Indigenous Agency in Federal Indian Education Policy, 1819-2018
Graduate of University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Assistant Professor, Carleton College

Outstanding Dissertation Semifinalist:
Dr. Melissa Navarro
Dissertation Title:
A Critical Examination of Dual-language Science Educators: Ideology, Pedagogy, Access, And Equity
Graduate of Claremont Graduate University & San Diego State University
Assistant Professor, California State University, Dominguez Hills

Outstanding Dissertation Semifinalist:
Dr. Michael Singh
Dissertation Title:
Becoming Neoliberal Subjects: Power and Resistance in a School-based Mentorship Program for Latino Boys
Graduate of University of California, Berkeley
University of California President’s Postdoctoral Fellow
University of California, Santa Barbara

2019 CESJ Award Winners

Outstanding Dissertation:
Dr. Joe Curnow - Ontario Institute for Studies in Edu-cation, University of Toronto.

Outstanding Dissertation:
Dr. Stephanie Cariaga - University of California, Los Angeles

Scholar-Activist & Community Advocacy:
Dr. Carolina Valdez, California State University, Fullerton

Scholar-Activist & Community Advocacy:
Dr. Jamila Lyiscott, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Revolutionary Mentor:
Dr. Alyssa Hadley Dunn, Michigan State University

2018 CESJ Award Winners

Outstanding Dissertation:
Jenna Cushing-Leubner, University Wisconsin Whitewater & Cati de los Rios, UC Riverside

Scholar-Activist & Community Advocacy:
Dani O’Brien UMass Amherst

Revolutionary Mentor:
Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, Teachers College Columbia

Jenna Cushing-Leubner

Cati de los Rios

Dani O'Brien

Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz

2017 CESJ Award Winners

Our list of winners for this year’s CESJ awards are shining examples of scholar activists, impactful leaders, and tremendous mentorship. Please take some time to read the work of these individuals, and if you cross paths with them, wish them congratulations!

Outstanding Dissertation Award-Dr. Bailey Smolarek

Dr. Bailey Smolarek's dissertation study explored policies and practices in the education of Latina/o immigrants in U.S. high schools through an ‘anthropology of policy’ lens. The issues that Dr. Bailey engaged with are at the cutting edge of research at the intersection of educational policy and applied linguistics; she has done much-needed border crossing between the two fields. She has drawn on this duality of expertise not only theoretically, but also in shaping her design and executing her study. Her scholarship, through a close anthropological look at the impact of educational and language policy on this particular group of students, contributes to understandings of schooling policies and practices, and their impact on the lives and academic achievement of Latinx immigrants.

Honorable Mention: Dawn Sherman

Scholar Activist/Community Advocacy Award-
Dr. Rita Kohli

Dr. Rita Kohli is an Assistant Professor at the University of California Riverside in the Department of Education, Society, and Culture. She is the co-founder and co-director of the Institute for Teachers of Color Committed to Racial Justice ( ITOC ). Kohli also served a four year term as chair and program chair for the Critical Educators for Social Justice ( CESJ ). Her co-authored article "Teachers, please learn our names!: Racial Microagressions and the K-12 Classroom" (Kohli & Solórzano, 2012) was featured on PBS and NPR, and has been downloaded more than 5800 times.

Revolutionary Mentor Award-Dr. Daniel Solórzano

Dr. Daniel Solórzano is the director of UC/ACCORD (All Campus Consortia on Research on Diversity) and a Professor of social science and comparative education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies and in the Chicana and Chicano Studies and Women’s Studies departments at the University of California, Los Angeles. Over his 44-year career Solórzano has taught and mentored students in and outside of the academy, chaired over 60 dissertation committees, and created the Center for Critical Race Studies at UCLA. Among Solórzano’s many awards are the 2014 AERA Scholar of Critical Race Theory, the 2012 Derrick Bell Legacy Award, and the 2012 AERA Social Justice in Education Award. Dr. Solórzano was nominated for this award by over fifty of his former doctoral students. In the words of one of them; “What is transformative about Danny, is that once you become his student, you become his student for a lifetime…I have always admired how someone so established and renowned can walk with so much humility, but this is Danny, he walks with purpose, love, and justice.”

Honorable Mention: Dr. Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz is an Associate Professor of English Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. She is also the founder of the Racial Literacy Roundtable Series at Teachers College and the co-founder of the Teachers College Civic Participation Project. Sealey-Ruiz has made the educational autobiography a centerpiece of her teaching philosophy and is known for taking authentic and compassionate interest in the lives of her students. Sealey-Ruiz has published 2 books and over 20 articles, many of which she coauthored with her doctoral students, and was awarded the 2016 AERA Mid-Career Award. In the words of one of her students; “The nature of her mentorship is one of critical engagement and community building rather than an authoritative relationship maintained purely for self-interest. She values everyone she works with as brilliant and important human beings.”

2016 CESJ Award Winners

This year’s CESJ award winners highlight the amazing and influential people our SIG attracts and the difference social justice educators can make in academia and their communities. We encourage you take a closer look at the work these individuals are doing.

2016 Scholar-Activist Award: Winner – Patrick Camangian

Patrick Camangian is an associate professor in the Teacher Education Department at the University of San Francisco. He has been an English teacher since 1999, beginning in the Los Angeles Unified School District where he was awarded "Most Inspirational Teacher" by former mayor Richard Riordan and the school's student body. Professor Camangian currently volunteers in the Oakland Unified School District teaching English. He has collaborated with groups such as California's People’s Education Movement, the Education for Liberation national network, and San Francisco's Teachers 4 Social Justice.

Honorable Mention – Luz Murillo

2016 Community Advocacy Award: Winner - Mary Hermes

Mary Hermes moved to the Lac Court Oreilles reservation during graduate school in 1993 where she spent 20 years raising her family and becoming immersed in the Ojibwe language. As a mixed-cultural-heritage person, Mary is proficient in the language and passionate about helping to return it to people like herself, whose ancestors spoke it for generations. She helped found the Waadookodaading School in Lac Court Oreilles and is the lead researcher for the Ojibwe Conversational Archives project. Today, her work takes her into the homes of elders recording the language. It also takes her into the homes of young families to investigate the effectiveness of various teaching methods and technologies.

Honorable Mentions-
Katherine Bruna
Erin Dyke
Jaime Del Razo
Joyce Elaine King
Valerie Kinloch
Mariana Pacheco
Mark Warren
Rachael Wendler

2016 Outstanding Dissertation Award: Winner- Sakeena Everett
Dissertation Title: Disrupting the Single Story: Cultivating More Complete Stories about Academically High Performing Young Black Men.

Sakeena Everett is the director of research and outreach for the College’s Black Male Early Literacy Impact Project. Her dissertation defined traits of Black male success in secondary education settings Her study began in an academic enrichment summer program for rising juniors that focused on understanding Black male success through narrative. Participants possessed GPAs of 3.0 or better, high ACT scores and eventual full-ride scholarships to college. Students engaged with critical theories of education to compose narratives describing their experiences in education, essays that in some cases served as college application material. After the summer program, she built on these writing experiences, working to equip her students with language to defend and define themselves. Her students read Paulo Freire’s “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” and scholarly journal articles, examining how research reflected—and did not reflect—their experiences as students. Everett tracked these students as they completed their high school education, interviewing students, teachers, administrators, friends and family to gain a nuanced understanding of how the students conceptualized their academic success and what informed and sustained these successes. She witnessed students’ confidence as writers growing as they progressed through these experiences.

AWARDS

Revolutionary Mentor

This new CESJ award recognizes the essential role mentorship plays in supporting critical scholarship. This award recognizes a scholar who has made distinguished contributions in the mentoring of PK-12 students, undergraduate, and graduate students, and/or junior scholars, as a means of helping to develop critical social justice scholars, educators, and activists.

DISSERTATION

This AERA-sanctioned award recognizes a dissertation of exemplary conceptual, methodological and rhetorical quality on an important topic that specifically and skillfully addresses social justice issues in education. Click on the button above for more information about past winners and how to submit an application.

SCHOLAR-ACTIVIST

This AERA-sanctioned award recognizes a junior, mid or advanced-career scholar-activist (Assistant, Associate or Full professor) who has made distinguished contributions linking scholarship with activism focused on issues of social justice to improve the educational conditions of students, families and/or communities. Click on the button above for more information about past winners and how to submit an application.