2008 Kingston-Mann Awards Ceremony
Diversity, Academic Excellence, New Student Opportunities Celebrated at 2008 Kingston-Mann Awards Ceremony
On November 2, 2007, UMass Boston Chancellor Keith Motley welcomed students, their families, faculty advisors, and administrators to the third annual Kingston-Mann Awards Banquet celebrating undergraduate student contributions to scholarship on diversity and inclusion. Jose Luiz Filho-Pradho and Lydia Grinnell of UMass Boston were among the top prizewinners chosen from a consortium of New England colleges and universities that includes UMass Boston, UMass Dartmouth, Lesley University, Emmanuel College, UMass Lowell, Massasoit Community College, Rhode Island College, and the University of New Hampshire.
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Click on picture for slideshow Photos by Harry Brett |
Responding to the spirit of joyful celebration that marked the public recognition of student research, Chancellor Motley noted the feeling in the room of “righteousness” in the “best sense of doing something truly right.” Keynote speaker Hubie Jones, widely admired as an education leader and social justice advocate, described the event as a “microcosm of what the world could be like when we embrace inclusivity and link it to academic excellence.” The awards committee chair, Professor Maureen Scully of UMass Boston’s College of Management, pointed out that “in an increasingly diverse global economy, students with a sophisticated understanding of the legacy and implications of diversity will be much better equipped to realize and create new opportunities in the workplace.”
The awards program originated in 2004 and was named for Professor Esther Kingston-Mann, the former director of the Center for the Improvement of Teaching at UMass Boston. A visionary who sparked the creation of the New England Center for Inclusive Teaching and Scholarship, Kingston-Mann is also an award-winning scholar and holder of the Roy J. Zuckerberg Endowed Chair for Academic Leadership. Emphasizing the transformative impact of student research, Kingston-Mann quoted a former student: “You come to see teachers differently. There may be a particular professor who thinks they are God, but you know they are not. Now that you’ve worked on a research project, they are much less intimidating.” According to Kingston-Mann, “This is the most exciting kind of educational transformation, as student researchers situate themselves on the same continuum—though not at the same location—as their professors.”
Initially funded by the Ford Foundation, this project has been supported by the Roy J. Zuckerberg endowment. The Chancellor’s office of UMass Boston has generously supported the project. C ontributions from the participating colleges and universities make the project possible and reflect the truly collaborative spirit of the project. Students from each of these schools have received honors over the past three years.
Students and faculty advisers are encouraged to submit papers that contribute to diversity/inclusion research. Application guidelines and excerpts from former prizewinning submissions are available at www.km-awards.umb.edu. Applications for the next round of awards are due on May 12, 2008.