Awards and Accolades

By: NWP Staff
Publication: The Voice, Vol. 5, No. 4
Date: September-October 2000

Summary: Read about your writing project colleagues' most recent publications and accomplishments at our Awards and Accolades page.

Alaska

Alaska State Writing Consortium

Karen Mitchell, ASWC board member, was appointed coordinator of the Breadloaf Rural Teachers Network and the BLTN state moderators for 1999–2000.

Samantha Dunaway, ASWC board member, published “Winter Walk, After an Argument” in Explorations Fall 1999, and “Convincing Hansel” in The GSU Review, Spring 1998.

ASWC board member Dorothy Gray published “Rebirth of a Rectory” on the National Trust for Historic Preservation Web site.

Arkansas

Northwest Arkansas Writing Project

Cheri Olmstead, 1999 Fellow, received an Arkansas Humanities Grant in May to purchase literature for her school's multi-age classrooms. The grant will support humanities-based curriculum units that her teaching team will be writing to accompany literature sets they have purchased.

Director Samuel Totten published “Diminishing the Complexity and Horror of the Holocaust: Using Simulations in an Attempt to Convey Historical Experiences” in the April 2000 issue of Social Education, the official journal of the National Council for the Social Studies.

Kidswrite codirectors Lynette Terrell (1997 Fellow), Betsy Penix (1997 Fellow), and Lacinda Files (1997 Fellow) received a grant from Chapbooks.com, an Internet publishing company. The grant will cover all publishing costs for the Kidswrite 2000 anthology. Each Kidswrite participant will receive a copy of the professionally printed book, and a copy of the anthology will be sent to each student's school library.

Little Rock Writing Project

Director Rich Raymond recently received the Excellence in Teaching Award for the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at the University of Arkansas—Little Rock. Also, Rich's “Building Learning Communities on Non-Residential Campuses” received the Best Article of the Year award from Teaching English in the Two-Year College.

California

Bay Area Writing Project

Elizabeth Lay, 1990 Fellow, was named High School Teacher of the Year by the California Council for Social Studies for her innovative work in developing and teaching a rigorous California Studies program to ninth graders at Oakland Technical High School in Oakland, CA.

Verda Delp, 1981 and 1983 Fellow, and Sarah Warshauer Freedman received a three-year grant from the Spencer Foundation to study teaching English in untracked classrooms. It involves a teacher research/university research collaboration.

Bruce Greene, 1993 Fellow, published “A Blaze of Glory” in Blood-Horse Magazine, August 1999.

Deborah Archuleta Juarez, 1993 Fellow, published “A Question of Fairness: Using Writing and Literature to Expand Ethnic Identity and Understand Marginality,” in Inside City Schools: Investigating Literacy in Multicultural Classrooms, by Sarah Warshauer Freedman, Elizabeth Radin Simons, Julie Shalhope Kalnin, Alex Casareno, and the M-Class teams, Teachers College Press and National Council of Teachers of English, 1999.

Rebeca Garcia-Gonzalez, 1994 Fellow, published “Teaching So Learners Can Teach,” by Porter, Mejia, Garcia-Gonzalez in Making Justice Our Project, edited by C. Edelsky, NCTE, 2000.

Theresa Tensuan, 1995 Fellow, published “Volunteering at the Catholic Worker Free Clinic: A Privileged Perspective” in House of Grace Newsletter, Philadelphia, 1999.

Rod Septka, 1996 Fellow, published “The Goose and the Snake” in Spider Magazine, 2000.

Vicky Greenbaum, 1999 Fellow, published, “Lenses of Gender,” English Journal 1998, excerpted in Education Digest, September 1999.

Meredith Pike-Baky, 1999 Fellow, published Tapestry Writing 1 & Tapestry Writing 2, Heinle & Heinle, 2000.

San Joaquin Valley Writing Project

Director Gail Tompkins received the 2000 Provost's Award for Teaching Excellence at California State University, Fresno, the most prestigious faculty award at CSUF. Gail credits her work with the SJVWP as a big part of the reason that she was selected as this year's recipient. As part of her award, Gail delivered the commencement speech at the CSUF Commencement on May 20, 2000.

Connecticut

Connecticut Writing Project, Storrs

Carole Jonaitis, 1988 Fellow, and site director Mary Mackley, 1984 Fellow, presented at the Fourth International Conference for Global Conversations on Language and Literacy in Utrecht, Holland, in August of 2000. The session focused on a teacher research project that addresses the question: What role can reflective-collaborative debate play in the development of critical literacy for high school students?

Delaware

Delaware Writing Project

Susan Gilmore received the Diamond State Reading Association President's Award.

Stephanie DeWitt received a Leadership Grant from the National Foundation for the Improvement of Education for teacher-training in improving students' writing skills.

Deborah Brady was named Teacher of the Year for Baltz Elementary School.

Ann Whitman was named Language Arts Teacher of the Year for Benjamin Banneker Elementary.

District of Columbia

District of Columbia Area Writing Project

Elizabeth A. Davis, 1995 Fellow, was named D.C. Public School System's (DCPS) Vocational Teacher of the Year. She is a member of DCAWP's Project Outreach Network (PON) team and the chair of their Anti-Racist Equity Committee.

Patricia D. Bradford (1993 Northern Virginia WP Fellow, now with DCAWP) was named Prince George's County, Maryland Teacher of the Year. She helped to write the grant that established DCAWP and has facilitated two of their summer institutes.

Aressa V. Williams, 1995 Fellow, was nominated by a student and selected to be honored in the sixth edition of Who's Who Among America's Teachers. Aressa retired from DCPS and now teaches at Anne Arundel Community College. She also teaches inservice courses for DCAWP.

Judith M. Kelly, 1995 Fellow and DCAWP codirector, and Patricia D. Bradford were honored on June 10, 2000, by the D.C. Council of Teachers of English as outstanding leaders in English Language Arts.

Four DCAWP TCs, Judith M. Kelly, Elizabeth A. Davis, Cynthia L. Henderson (1995 Fellow), and Audrey Hawkins (1995 Fellow), were selected for a ten-day trip to Israel, sponsored by the United States Holocaust Museum. They were invited as an outgrowth of their Project Outreach work with the Museum. Cynthia is the DCAWP Project Outreach Network coordinator. Audrey is the DCPS English language arts content specialist and DCAWP's liaison with DCPS.

Georgia

Kennesaw Mountain Writing Project

Jennifer Scrivner, 1995 Fellow, and her colleagues Deborah Childs-Bowen and Gayle Moller published their article “Principals—Leaders of Leaders” in the May 2000 NASSP Bulletin.

Two KMWP teacher-consultants were recently named Teacher of the Year at their respective schools: Patsy Hamby, 1994 Fellow, Teacher of the Year at Hiram High School in Dallas, Georgia; and Almeada Young, 1997 Fellow, Teacher of the Year at Garrett Middle School in Mableton, Georgia.

Hawai`i

Hawai`i Writing Project

1983 Fellow Joe Tsujimoto's book Lighting Bonfires: How the Passionate Teacher Inspires Adolescent Writers has been accepted for publication by Heinemann. His previous publications include Teaching Poetry Writing to Adolescents (NCTE, 1988). Joe teaches the middle grades at Punahou School.

Christopher McKinney, 1998 Fellow, was keynote speaker for graduation ceremonies at Honolulu Community College, where he teaches English.

Three TCs are advisors for student literary magazines receiving awards from NCTE's Program to Recognize Excellence in Student Literary Magazines. Classified as superior is Iolani School's Mane O Ke Ola, advisor Roberta Tom, 1984 Fellow; classified as excellent is Maryknoll High School's The Toad, advisor Frankie Lucas, 1984 Fellow; classified as above average is Moanalua High School's magazine, advisor Michelle Colte, 1997 Fellow.

Illinois

Illinois State Writing Project

Jean Wallace, 1992 Fellow, is president of the Illinois Association of Teachers of English this year. Jean has been a teacher-leader in the Illinois State Writing Project since its beginning.

Chicago Area Writing Project

Two teacher-consultants won the highly coveted Golden Apple Award for excellence in teaching: Sharon Frost, who teaches first grade at Norwood Park School, and Jill Sontag, who teaches third grade at Inter-American School. Eleven CAWP teachers have won Golden Apple awards.

Kentucky

Purchase Area Writing Project

Sarah Oliver, 1999 Fellow, received the Al Crabb award at the Kentucky Council of Teachers of English/Language Arts conference in Lexington, KY, Feb. 11–12. Sarah is a writing resource teacher at North Elementary in Calloway County, KY. The Al Crabb award is given annually to a KY teacher with three or fewer years' experience and includes a year of free membership in KCTE and expenses for the next state conference. In addition, Prentice-Hall is donating $500 toward Ms. Oliver's expenses to NCTE, 2000.

Western Kentucky University Writing Project

Galena Fulkerson, 1992 Fellow, wrote project programs for two schools in McLean County, which received Title I Distinguished Awards. Calhoun received a National Award and Livermore received a state award. Galena was sent to Indianapolis to receive the National Award, one of only two given to the state; McLean County was the only district in the state to receive two rewards.

Massachusetts

Western Massachusetts Writing Project

Michael Silverstone, 1999 Fellow, published Rigoberta Menchu: Defending Human Rights in Guatemala with Feminist Press.

Bruce M. Penniman, Codirector and 1994 Fellow, received an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst on May 20, 2000.

Diana F. Callahan, codirector and 1993 Fellow, was presented the Community Outreach Award from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst on May 3, 2000.

Gail Gilman, 1993 Fellow, was named Educator of the Year by the Tri-County Chamber of Commerce in Sturbridge, MA, on May 22, 2000.

Bonnie Moriarty, 1995 Fellow, received the Teaching Excellence Award from the Springfield, MA, Chamber of Commerce on June 2, 2000.

Missouri

Gateway Writing Project

Gary Ryan, 1990 Fellow, published a book chapter based on his multiyear action research in writing with new technology. Called “Epistemic Conversations: Creating Socratic Dialogue in Hypertext,” the chapter appears in Contexts, Intertexts, Hypertexts, edited by Scott DeWitt and Kip Strasma (Hampton Press, 1999).

New Jersey

NWP at Rutgers University

Michael W. Smith, director of the NWP at Rutgers University and coeditor of Research in the Teaching of English, had an article entitled “Complements or Conflicts: Conceptions of Discussion and Multicultural Literature in a Teachers-as-Readers Discussion Group” accepted for publication by the Journal of Literacy Research.

Bill Connolly, codirector of the NWP at Rutgers University, continues to be a frequent contributor to the South Jersey Commentary page of the Philadelphia Inquirer. His seventh commentary in the past year was published on June 8. In it, he reflects on his daughter's kindergarten “graduation” ceremony and how the ceremony and the enthusiasm of the kindergarteners compares to that of most high school students and their graduations.

Angela Bodino was named New Jersey Carnegie Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and Council for Advancement and Support of Education. Her portfolio of work focused on the pedagogy of writing in interdisciplinary teaching, in online courses, and in dual credit English courses at area high schools.

The National Council of Instructional Administrators of the Community College Association gave first place honors to Angela Bodino's team-taught, online, interdisciplinary course “Global Patterns of Racism: Anthropological, Historical, and Literary Perspectives” offered at Raritan Valley Community College. The honor was specifically for classroom innovation.

Rhode Island

Rhode Island Writing Project

Janine Napolitano Howarth, 1996 Fellow, was named a Rhode Island Department of Education Distinguished Teacher. Distinguished teacher status is granted through a combination of school district referral and credential screening. Rhode Island's Distinguished Teachers sit on statewide committees and task forces dealing with educational topics.

Audrey Friedman, 1992 Fellow, recently submitted several articles to the Web site Themestream.com. Previously, Audrey has been published in various literary journals including: CQ, Damaged Goods, The Poet's Edge, The Leaflet, The Crone's Nest, Urban Spaghetti, The Black Buzzard Review, Melange, IdioM, and Poetry Motel.

Virginia

Northern Virginia Writing Project

Claudia Kilmer, 1999 Fellow, has published “Building Writing” in the Virginia English Bulletin, Spring, 2000.

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