Committee Chair: Susan Twombly, Professor Emerita, University of Kansas, stwombly@ku.edu

Committee Members:
Sarah L. Rodriguez, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Jerlando Jackson, Michigan State University
Frankie Santos Laanan, University of Utah
Anna Ortiz, California State University, Long Beach

Call for Award Nominations

Division J of the American Educational Research Association seeks nominations for the outstanding publication award. The purpose of this award is to bestow recognition on a colleague for a specific publication (book, book chapter, or journal article) judged as making a substantial contribution to the literature and/or practice of higher education. Publications may have more than one author, although edited texts are discouraged, and must have been published in the last 18 months. A substantial contribution is defined as scholarship that extensively revises our knowledge and understanding of a particular problem in the study of higher education or looks at it in a new way – a publication that moves the field forward in new ways. It may also be an interdisciplinary effort that identifies a problem new to the community of scholars in higher education. When nominating a publication, including a self-nomination, please be sure to address the criteria to aid in our review.

2025 Award Nomination Deadline: December 1, 2024

Please address questions and send nominations and electronic copies of publications to Susan Twombly, Awards Committee Chair, at stwombly@ku.edu. 

The Division J Outstanding Publication Award Committee is always considering new members. For more information, please contact Susan Twombly.

Previous award winners: 

2024: Mayra Puente, University of California, Santa Barbara and Verónica N. Vélez, Western Washington University, Platicando y Mapeando: a Chicana/Latina feminist GIS methodology in educational research

2023: Mary Blair-Loy, University of California, San Diego and Erin A. Cech, University of Michigan, Misconceiving Merit: Paradoxes of Excellence and Devotion in Academic Science and Engineering

2022: Eddie R. Cole, University of California, Los Angeles, The Campus Color Line: College Presidents and the Struggle for Black Freedom

2021: Xueli Wang, On My Own: The Challenge and Promise of Building Equitable STEM Transfer Pathways

2020: Leslie Gonzales, Dana Kanhai, & Kayon Hall, Michigan State University, Reimagining Organizational Theory for the Critical Study of Higher Education in M. Paulson (Ed), Higher Education Handbook of Theory and Research (2018)

2019: Nolan L. Cabrera, University of Arizona, White Guys on Campus: Racism, White Immunity, and the Myth of 'Post-Racial' Higher Education

2018: Jillian M. Duquaine-Watson, Mothering by Degrees: Single Mothers and the Pursuit of Postsecondary Education

2017: Z Nicolazzo, Trans* in College: Transgender Students' Strategies for Navigating Campus Life and the Institutional Policies of Inclusion.

2016: Ana Martínez Alemán, Brian Pusser, & Estela Bensimon, Critical Approaches to the Study of Higher Education

2015: Roger L. Geiger, History of American Higher Education: Learning and Culture From the Founding to World War II

2014: Elizabeth Armstrong & Laura Hamilton, Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality

2013: Kelly Ward & Lisa Wolf-Wendel, Academic motherhood: How faculty manage work and family

2012: Robert A. Rhoads & Katalin Szelenyi, Global Citizenship and the University: Advancing Social Life and Relations in an Interdependent World

2010: Ann Mullen, University of Toronto, Degrees of Inequality: Culture, Class, and Gender in American Higher Education

2010: Bruce Kimball, The Ohio State University, The Inception of Modern Professional Education: C.C. Langdell, 1826-1906

2009: Saran Donohoe, Reflections on Race: Affirmative Action Policies Influencing Higher Education in France and the United States

2008: Marybeth Gasman, Envisioning Black Colleges: A History of the United Negro College fund; Honorable Mention: Attewell & Lavin, Passing the Torch; Honorable Mention: Bess & Dee, Understanding College and University Organization  

2007: Bailey & Morest, Defending the Community College Equity Agenda; Moses & Marin, Moving Beyond Grazt and Grutter: The Next Generation of Research

2005: Elizabeth Allan, Constructing Women's Status:  Policy Discourses of University Women's Commissions, and Brian Pusser, Beyond Baldridge: Extending the Political Model of Higher Education Organization and Governance