Distinguished Contributions to Research in Education Award

Recipient: Kris D. Gutiérrez (University of California, Berkeley)

Dr. Kris D. Gutiérrez, the Carol Liu Chair and Distinguished Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, is the recipient of the 2024 Distinguished Contributions to Research in Education Award. Prof. Gutiérrez is a learning scientist and qualitative methodologist who has produced significant transformational research. Dr. Gutiérrez has made seminal contributions in the learning sciences through a cultural-historical theoretical approach to learning and development, expanding our understanding of culture in learning. Her most influential methodological contributions include multi-sited utopian methodologies described as social design-based experiments. Her highest recognitions from professional and scientific organizations include election as AERA President and election to the National Academy of Education, the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, and the British Academy.

The Distinguished Contributions to Research in Education Award is the premier acknowledgment of outstanding achievement and success in education research. It is designed to publicize, motivate, encourage, and suggest models for education research at its best.

Excellence in Media Reporting on Education Research Award

Recipient: Sarah Dockery Sparks (Education Week)

The 2024 Excellence in Media Reporting on Education Research Award goes to Sarah D. Sparks. Ms. Sparks is an award-winning journalist who has covered education research for Education Week since 2010. She skillfully translates scholarship, making it accessible to broader audiences. This past year, Sparks developed a nine-story series on “Miscalculating Math.” Reporting is not just Ms. Sparks’ job, it’s her life’s work. She mentors other reporters, and actively participates in AERA and the Institute of Education Sciences. Ms. Sparks’ journalist tools are thoughtful and thought-provoking. She brings diverse stakeholders and viewpoints into each story to report with accuracy and complexity. She is most deserving of this honor.

Established in 2016, this award recognizes a person who has made noteworthy contributions to reporting on findings, bodies of research, or scholarship in the field of education research in any medium of public communication. The award honors a media professional whose work exemplifies promoting a broader vision of the value of education research to society.

Palmer O. Johnson Memorial Award

Recipients:  Juan Del Toro (University of Minnesota), Ming-Te Wang (University of Chicago)
“Police Stops and School Engagement: Examining Cultural Socialization From Parents and Schools as Protective Factors Among African American Adolescents”
American Educational Research Journal, Volume 60, Issue 1, November 2022.

The recipients of the 2024 Palmer O. Johnson Memorial Award are Juan Del Toro and Ming-Te Wang for their article, “Police Stops and School Engagement: Examining Cultural Socialization From Parents and Schools as Protective Factors Among African American Adolescents,” published in February 2023 in the American Educational Research Journal. This article is a model of interdisciplinary research, integrating research from criminology, sociology, psychology, public health, and education to conceptualize the relationships among police surveillance, racial socialization, and school engagement in two samples of African American students. It finds that youth with police encounters have lower school engagement but demonstrates how cultural socialization via conversations about racial identity and navigating a discriminatory world can serve as a protective factor. This article stands out for its methodological creativity, timeliness, and relevance for both policy and practice.

The Palmer O. Johnson Memorial Award is presented annually in recognition of the most outstanding article published in an AERA journal. The elements of an outstanding article include: (1) significance of the contribution to advancing knowledge, (2) methodological sophistication and rigor, and (3) uniqueness in terms of problem specification or approach. Articles published in any one of the following AERA journals are eligible for consideration: AERA Open, American Educational Research Journal (AERJ), Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (EEPA), Educational Researcher (ER), or Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics (JEBS), except those articles that emanate from AERA public lectures. The selection committee considers all research articles published in the volume year immediately preceding the year in which the award is conferred. The award is granted based on substantial merit, as determined by the selection committee.

Review of Research Award

Recipients: Lolita A. Tabron (University of Denver), Amanda K. Thomas (University of the Southern Caribbean)
"Deeper than Wordplay: A Systematic Review of Critical Quantitative Approaches in Education Research (2007–2021)"
Review of Educational Research, Volume 93, Issue 5, February 2023.

The 2024 Review of Research Award is presented to Dr. Lolita A. Tabron and Dr. Amanda K. Thomas for their article "Deeper than wordplay: A systematic review of critical quantitative approaches in education research (2007-2021)," which was published in the October 2023 issue of Review of Educational Research. Tabron and Thomas’ manuscript is a cutting-edge contribution to the literature on race and schooling that works “to understand how critical approaches to quantitative inquiry emerged as a new paradigm within quantitative methods, and whether there is any distinction between quantitative criticalism, QuantCrit, and critical quantitative inquiries or simply interchangeable wordplay” (p. 756). As one reviewer shared, “this piece calls for an epistemological shift and emphasis that is crucial to moving the field forward.” Reviewers predicted that this manuscript will become a foundational publication for scholars to embrace.

This award is given in recognition of an outstanding review of research article appearing in the Review of Research in Education or the Review of Educational Research.

Outstanding Book Award

Recipient: Camika Royal (Morgan State University)
Not Paved For Us: Black Educators and Public School Reform in Philadelphia

The 2024 Outstanding Book Award is presented to Dr. Camika Royal, for her book Not Paved for Us: Black Educators and Public School Reform in Philadelphia. Dr. Royal subtly threads this historical account with a nod to hip hop pedagogy in the structure of each chapter. Using the epistemological lens of Critical Race Theory, Dr. Royal unapologetically presents the history of public school reform in Philadelphia. She engages the voices and experiences of former Black educators to amplify the anti-Black structural racism and cultural politics at play over a 50-year period in the large urban school district of Philadelphia.

The Outstanding Book Award was established to acknowledge and honor the year’s best book-length publication in education research and development.

E.F. Lindquist Award

Recipient: Gregory Cizek (University of North Carolina)

The recipient of the 2023 E. F. Lindquist Award, presented jointly by AERA and ACT, is Dr. Gregory J. Cizek. Dr. Cizek’s innovative contributions in assessment and measurement have advanced knowledge while also informing best practices in the field. Dr. Cizek is a valuable and productive scholar with over 100 articles, books, reports, and monographs. In addition to his tremendous scholarship, Dr. Cizek has also been a model citizen of the academy, having served in countless serves roles, including as president of the National Council on Measurement in Education. In the words of his nominator, “…[H]e is one of the top scholars in the world in three different important areas. His work on cheating on tests, setting performance standards on tests, and writings on validity have all been top notch.” Bestowing the E. F. Lindquist Award upon Gregory Cizek recognizes an exceedingly worthy research scientist and signals the important contributions that assessment and measurement can make to collective knowledge in education, and moreover, humankind.

This award is presented jointly by AERA and ACT in recognition of outstanding applied or theoretical research in the field of testing and measurement. The award is meant to acknowledge a body of research of an empirical, theoretical, or integrative nature rather than a single study.

Early Career Award

Recipient: Travis Jackson Bristol (University of California, Berkeley)

Dr. Travis Bristol is the recipient of the 2024 Early Career Award. Building on his career as a teacher, Dr. Bristol is well-known for his scholarship on the preparation, recruitment, and retention of teachers of color. As a leading researcher in this area, he has authored and co-authored 22 peer-reviewed articles, several book chapters, co-edited the Handbook of Research of Teachers of Color and Indigenous Teachers, and delivered 50 invited national and international addresses. Dr. Bristol has received over $5 million in research grants and highly competitive awards including the Ford Foundation and National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowships. Dr. Bristol’s incredible impact in the education field both in terms of research and practice is exemplary.

Established to honor an individual in the early stages of their career no later than 10 years after receipt of the doctoral degree, this award is granted for study in any field of educational inquiry.

Social Justice in Education Award

Recipient: Leah P. Hollis (Pennsylvania State University)

Dr. Leah Patricia Hollis is the 2024 Social Justice in Education Award recipient. Her program of research and practice focuses on issues of equity, inclusion, and social justice with particular attention to bullying in the academy. She examines the contexts and consequences of structural barriers that inform the trajectories and success of Black women and other women of color in higher education. Her three recent publications: Black women, intersectionality and workplace bullying (2022); Human resource perspectives on workplace bullying in higher education: Understanding vulnerable employees' experiences (2021); and The coercive community college: Bullying and its costly impact on the mission to serve underrepresented populations (2016), uncover a new intellectual and scholarly space around how bullying intersects with gender and race in the academy. Her scholarship enhances developing and existing theoretical frameworks, uncovers nascent knowledge about the unfavorable consequences of bullying, and has been used to inform anti-bullying policies and practices across university campuses. Dr. Hollis is an excellent model of a scholar whose work embodies social justice in action.

Established in 2004, the Social Justice in Education Award honors an individual who has advanced social justice through education research and exemplified the goal of linking education research to social justice.

Distinguished Contributions to Gender Equity in Education Research Award

Recipient: Jennifer Esposito (Georgia State University)

The recipient of the 2024 Distinguished Contributions to Gender Equity in Education Research Award is Dr. Jennifer Esposito. Through her field-bending research at the nexus of race, class, gender, and sexuality, Dr. Esposito has both interrogated relationships between identity, power, and privilege and offered us methodological tools to move marginalized voices to the center. In addition to the influence of her substantial body of peer-reviewed published offerings, the profound impact of her caring tutelage ripples through the careers of hundreds of justice-oriented scholars. As a scholar, mentor, and servant leader, Dr. Esposito’s contributions should be counted as both distinguished and inspirational for us all.

Established in 2006, the Distinguished Contributions to Gender Equity in Education Research Award recognizes individuals within AERA for distinguished research, professional practice, and activities that advance public understanding of gender and/or sexuality at any level in the education community.

Outstanding Public Communication of Education Research Award

Recipient: Thomas S. Dee (Stanford University)

Dr. Thomas S. Dee is the recipient of the 2024 Outstanding Public Communication of Education Research Award. Superlatives hardly capture the impact and reach of Professor Dee’s scholarship. He has illustrated the implications of displacement by immigration enforcement through op-eds and collaborated with journalists at the New York Times to provide timely and policy-shaping insights on chronic absenteeism and academic recovery in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Dee’s substantial contributions to the understanding of national educational challenges and the translation of complex findings to wide audiences provide a blueprint for excellence in the public communication of education research.

This award honors scholars exemplary in their capacity to communicate the importance of education research to the broad public, including education communities. It recognizes scholars who have excelled in conveying important findings and research to wide audiences and who have demonstrated the capacity to deepen understanding and appreciation of the value of education research in the public sphere.

Scholars of Color Distinguished Career Contribution Award

Recipient: Felicia Moore Mensah (Teachers College, Columbia University)

Dr. Felicia Moore Mensah is the recipient of the 2024 Scholars of Color in Education Distinguished Career Contribution Award. Dr. Mensah’s research agenda focuses on addressing issues of diversity and equity within science teacher education. Through this research, she advances scholarship that attends to creating equitable and just science teacher preparation programs, science curricula, and science pedagogies. This includes producing scholarship on mentoring and supporting junior science education scholars to advance science education and science teacher education research and praxis. Through her research, she has furthered the field’s understandings of the impact that Eurocentric science culture, racism, and other inequities in science teacher preparation programs have had on Black and Brown students’ access to and engagement within science.

Presented to a senior-level scholar, usually 20 years or more after receipt of the doctoral degree, this award is intended to recognize (a) scholars who have made significant contributions to the understanding of issues that disproportionately affect minority populations, and (b) minority scholars who have made a significant contribution to education research and development.  

Recipient: Francesca Lopez (Pennsylvania State University)

Dr. Francesca Lopez is the 2024 recipient of the Scholars of Color in Education Mid-Career Contribution Award. Dr. Lopez’s prolific work focuses on asset pedagogies, language learning and Latino English learners, and education policy related to race. She conceptualizes asset-based pedagogies as practices that incorporate students’ culture and language into the classroom teaching process, that are grounded in teachers’ critical awareness of the contexts of oppression in which students and their families live. Her research employs a “race-reimagined” perspective that, rather than enumerating deficits students bring, views students as bringing assets to the classroom that can be capitalized on in curriculum and pedagogy.

Presented to a scholar in mid-career who is beyond the first level of professional appointment and for whom 10 or more years have passed since receipt of the doctoral degree, this award is intended to recognize (a) scholars who have made significant contributions to the understanding of issues that disproportionately affect minority populations, and (b) minority scholars who have made a significant contribution to education research and development.

Scholars of Color Early Career Contribution Award

Recipient: Nichole Margarita Garcia (Rutgers University)

Dr. Nichole M. Garcia is the recipient of the 2024 Scholars of Color in Education Early Career Contribution Award. Her advocacy for BIPOC students is present across her scholarship and praxis. Her groundbreaking comparative study employed Critical Race Transformative Convergent Mixed Methods to examine the academic achievement, attitudes, and expectations of Chicanx and Puerto Rican college-educated nuclear families. Dr. Garcia’s work draws upon Critical Theory, Critical Race Theory, QuantCrit and Women of Color Feminisms. Currently, Dr. Garcia investigates the impact of disaster-related experiences on Latinx undergraduate students, employing mixed methods guided by disaster capitalism to understand its effects on their psychosocial, social, and academic development in higher education.

Presented to a scholar who is within the first decade of their career after receipt of a doctoral degree, this award is intended to recognize (a) scholars who have made significant contributions to the understanding of issues that disproportionately affect minority populations, and (b) minority scholars who have made a significant contribution to education research and development.