Nominations sought for president’s awards for public engagement

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University of Michigan leaders are encouraging campus community members to nominate faculty members who have demonstrated a commitment to public service for the president’s awards for public engagement.

Launched in 2017, the President’s Award for National and State Leadership and the President’s Award for Public Impact aim to celebrate faculty public engagement at U-M.

The award for national and state leadership honors individuals who have held leadership and service roles in major national, state, local or community capacities. Recipients will have contributed to the health, resilience and prosperity of the nation, state and society at large, or support a safe global environment.

The award for public impact honors individuals who have offered their academic research and expertise in tangible service of a major public sector challenge. Recipients will have actively addressed significant challenges in society and have used their academic capacity and expertise to combat such threats, in cooperation with governmental and non-governmental stakeholders.

The awards are part of the university’s greater institutional effort to promote and support faculty public engagement, an initiative President Mark Schlissel said aims to help faculty share their expertise with the public and showcase the public value of university research.

“For generations, the Michigan faculty have made big, crucial contributions to national policy — and in most every other domain that affects humanity,” Schlissel said. “Our renewed focus on faculty public engagement seeks to stimulate faculty to share their considerable expertise and research capacity with the public, through purposeful efforts focused outside the academy.”

Nominations for both awards must be submitted by Dec. 6. Recipients will receive $5,000.

Awardees will be recommended to the president by a committee, appointed by Schlissel, that includes members of the faculty, the U-M Office of Research and the Office of Government Relations.

The award is open to tenured, tenure-track or research faculty from all U-M campuses, schools, colleges and units. Members of other categories of instructional faculty may also be nominated.

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