Brooklyn College | Research & Awards

Recent Faculty Honors and Awards

Brooklyn College faculty garner national and international honors and awards in the fields of education, technology, the arts, literature, law, and economics, among others. Recent accolades include:

Noel Anderson, Political Science, received the 2008 Whitney M. Young, Jr. Education Leadership Award from the National Urban League. As co-principal investigator/co-director of Brooklyn College’s ERIS/Black Male Initiative and Research—2008–2009, Anderson also received, together with his group, a $112,200 grant from City University of New York/New York City Council for implementing and evaluating recruitment and retention programming for Black males and other under-represented groups at Brooklyn College.
Patricia Antoniello, Health and Nutrition Sciences, received the Cornaro Award from the New York State Chapter of the Sons of Italy in 2008 for her work on behalf of women on campus and her promotion of research on women-related issues.
Swapna Banerjee, History, was awarded a Whiting Fellowship in 2008, which recognizes outstanding teachers in the humanities, making them eligible for additional paid sabbaticals for research.
Myles Bassell, Economics, coached ten teams of four students to develop and present a comprehensive merchandising plan for Target stores aimed at the multicultural consumer. Six of his students won the $3,000 prize the store awards as part of the Target Case Study Program (2008).
Moustafa Bayoumi, English, received one of the Before Columbus Foundation’s American Book Awards in 2008 for his book, How Does it Feel to Be a Problem: Being Young and Arab in America (Penguin Press, 2008). The award recognizes literary excellence from America’s diverse literary community.
Christian Benes, Mathematics, was awarded a grant from the Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Information and Discovery, in Alberta, Canada, to organize the workshop “The Rate of Convergence of Loop-Erased Random Walk to SLE(2)” (2008).
David C. Bloomfield, Education, along with the New York City Department of Education and other partners, received a $3.6 million grant in 2008 from the U.S. Department of Education for the School Leadership Program Initiative, a five-year online school leadership development project. He was also a panelist on Mayoral Control of School Governance at the Manhattan Institute’s Center for Civic Innovation Forum (2008).
Stacey Brenner, Chemistry, received a grant from the National Institutes of Health to support her research on small, bioactive molecules as catalysts for organic reactions, and their potential for treating disease.
Georges Brunner, Music, was one of only two American composers in 2009 to receive a commission and residency at the Institut International de Musique Eletroacoustique in Bourges, France. His composition “The Candle and the Mirror” premiers in summer 2009 in France. Brunner’s compositions also were featured in 2008 in the electroacoustic drama The Tempest Project, produced by Electronic Music New York. Brunner’s Songs from Another Place were recorded and included on the CD of the same title (MSR Classics, 2008).
Daniel Campos, Philosophy, was awarded a Whiting Fellowship in 2008, which recognizes outstanding teachers in the humanities, making them eligible for additional paid sabbaticals for research.
The Center for Women’s Studies was awarded a grant from the Westchester Jewish Women’s Fund for its Shirley Chisholm Archive project.
William P. Childers, Modern Languages and Literatures, was awarded the Katherine Singer Kovacs Prize for his book, Transnational Cervantes (University of Toronto Press, 2006). The prize, given by the Modern Language Association, honors an outstanding book published in English in the field of Latin American and Spanish literatures and cultures.
James Davis, English, was awarded a writing fellowship for 2008–2009 by the Leon Levy Center for Biography at CUNY Graduate Center. He is currently at work on a biography of Eric Walrond, a Caribbean-born writer and journalist who rose to prominence in New York during the Harlem Renaissance.
Christopher Ebert, History, was awarded a PSC-CUNY Research Foundation grant in 2008 to investigate the colonial economic and social history of Salvador da Bahia through archives in Rio de Janeiro and Salvador. He also published Between Empires: Brazilian Sugar in the Early Atlantic Economy, 1550–1630 (Brill, 2008), and was awarded a Whiting Fellowship in 2008, which recognizes outstanding teachers in the humanities, making them eligible for additional paid sabbaticals for research..
Jason Eckardt, Music, was commissioned by the Miller Theater at Columbia University to set Laura Mullen’s poetry to music for soprano and ten instrumentalists (2008).
Dan Eshel, Biology, was appointed in 2008 to the editorial board of Biochemistry Insights, a new journal in the field.
Ray Gavin, Biology, was awarded a grant extension in 2008 from the National Science Foundation for the ground-breaking research he and his Brooklyn College Biology Department team has been doing on direct pathways to cell nuclei.
Alexander Greer, Chemistry, was honored in 2008 with the task of serving as guest editor for an issue of Journal of Sulfur Chemistry devoted to extreme sulfur chemistry. Greer was also invited to join the editorial boards of Research Letters in Organic Chemistry (Hindawi Publishers) and Molecular Diversity (Springer Publishers).
Timothy Gura, Speech, was chosen by the National Communication Association (NCA) to receive the Wallace A. Bacon Lifetime Teaching Excellence Award for 2008. The NCA is the oldest professional organization in the discipline, and the Bacon prize is the only one they bestow.
Olympia Hadjiliadis, Mathematics, together with her colleague T. Schaefer from College of Staten Island, were honored with a CUNY Collaborative Grant for their project “Multidimensional Quickest Detection” (2008).
Dean Louise Hainline and Peter Lipke from the Department of Biology were granted further support in 2008 from the National Institutes of Health for their work on the Brooklyn College MARC (Minority Access to Research Careers) program to increase the number of minority students in biomedical research. Dean Hainline was also responsible in 2009 for securing a grant of $479,000 from the Department of Energy to restore the greenhouse atop Ingersoll Extension
Amy Hempel, English, was awarded the 2008 Rea Award for the Short Story, which includes a $30,000 prize. The award designates a writer whose work has made “a significant contribution to the discipline of the short story form.” It is considered one of the top awards for short story writing in North America.
Curtis D. Hardin, Psychology, was appointed in 2008 editor-in-chief of the journal Social Justice Research.
KC Johnson, History, spent the 2007–8 academic year as the Fulbright Distinguished Chair in the Humanities at Tel Aviv University in Israel.
Danielle L. Kellogg, Classics, was awarded a Whiting Fellowship in 2008, which recognizes outstanding teachers in the humanities, making them eligible for additional paid sabbaticals for research.
Gertrude Lenzer, Sociology, obtained startup funds in 2008 of $125,000 for each of three years, as well as matching funds of $125,000, from the CUNY Office of Academic Affairs for a wide-ranging proposal on the creation of a CUNY Children’s Studies Institute for Research, Policy, and Public Service. In addition, she secured collaboration in the project from the CUNY School of Law and the CUNY Graduate Center, as well as from a distinguished core faculty from these institutions and Brooklyn College. Lenzer also launched an online children’s studies publication, New Horizons, in the summer of 2008.
Tania León, Music, was honored when one of her compositions was chosen for performance at the opening concert of the meeting of the International Congress on Women in Music, in Beijing in April 2008. The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) also awarded León their 2008-2009 ASCAPLUS Award, in recognition of her concert work.
Peter Lipke, Biology, was awarded a grant from the National Institutes of Health in 2008 for his research on cell adhesion proteins in fungal life cycles and pathogenesis.
Martha Nadell, English, was awarded a Claire Tow Distinguished Teacher Award in 2008 for excellence in the classroom.
Jürgen Polle, Biology, who received a major grant in 2007 from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research for creating a collection of microalgae for biofuels research, was granted an extension of support for the project in 2008.
Hervé Queneau, Economics, and Robert Oliva and Pam Brown, Magner Center for Career Development and Internships, were awarded a CUNY Work Force Development Grant (2008).
Sara Reguer, Judaic Studies, was among twenty-five international applicants whose proposals were accepted in 2008 for participation in a multidisciplinary conference/project to be held at The New York Public Library, entitled “The Sword of Judith.” Funded by the Brine Family Charitable Trust, which provides a monetary grant to each participant, the project promotes collaborative practice by coordinating individual research agendas on any aspect of the book or figure of Judith within a year-long technology-enabled team effort.
Laura Reigada, Psychology, was awarded a research grant of $270,000 from the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America to study treatments for anxiety disorders in adolescents.
Corey Robin, Political Science, was awarded three fellowships to fund academic research in 2007–08: the Laurance S. Rockefeller Visiting Fellowship at Princeton University’s Center for Human Values; a Princeton University Program in Ethics and Public Affairs Fellowship; and a fellowship from the American Council on Learned Societies.
Nancy Romer and Diane Reiser, Brooklyn College Community Partnership for Research and Learning, received major grants (totaling nearly $50,000) in 2008-9 from the New York State Department of Education and the NYS Higher Education Services Corporation for their creation of after-school programs for middle school students in under-served neighborhoods of Brooklyn.
Laurie Rubel, Education, was awarded a five-year, National Science Foundation CAREER grant of $625,137 in 2008 for her project “Teacher Leaning Communities: Centering the Teaching of Mathematics on Urban Youth.” The much-coveted award supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher scholars by integrating education and research. Rubel also has been named to the review board of the American Educational Research Association’s Division C, Teaching and Learning, Section 3 Mathematics (2008).
E. Lynn Savage, Geology, was honored in 2008 with a Certificate of Appreciation by the officers and members of the 2006–2007 council of the Geological Society of America (GSA). Savage dedicated three years to the creation of a new GSA division that promotes the study of the influence of geology and the environment on human, animal, and plant health and disease. The certificate honored her concept and her contribution to establishing the new GSA unit, known as the Geology and Health Division of the GSA.
Anthony Sclafani, Psychology, was among seven scientists in 2009 to receive a two-year, $222,775 grant from the Ajinomoto Amino Acid Research Grant to conduct research into flavor conditioning by glutamate.
Deborah Shanley, Education, was appointed in 2008 to the National Parks Second Century Commission, where she will represent education.
Jessica Max Stein, English, won an Amy Award for lyric poetry from the magazine Poets and Writers for several of her poems.
Jeffrey Taylor, Music, won the American Musicological Society’s Claude V. Palisca award in 2008 for his meticulous transcriptions of selected piano solos by jazz pianist Earl Hines.
Sheila Tejada and Simon Parsons, Computer and Information Science, in collaboration with John Jannone, Television and Radio, received a 2008 grant from the National Science Foundation to research the technological frontier of mixed reality applications, where real and virtual worlds interact.
Ellen Tremper, English, received honorable mention for the Emily Toth Award, which honors women-centered studies and is sponsored by the Popular Culture Association of America.
Deborah J. Walder, Psychology, together with her team and colleague-mentor Anthony Sclafani, was honored with a National Alliance for Research in Schizophrenia and Depression 2008 Young Investigator Award for the project “Diffusion Tensor Imaging and Structural MRI Abnormalities in Adolescents At-Risk for Depression: The Role of Early Life Stress and 5-HTTLPR.”
Michael Washington, Music, was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship for 2008–9 to travel to South Africa for his research project on the aesthetics and social valences of South African jazz. He will devote part of his time to lecturing at the University of Dwazulu-Natal, in Durban.
Betina Zolkower, Education, was awarded a grant in 2008 from the National Science Foundation’s Discovery Research K 12 program, to appraise mentoring strategies for beginning math teachers in middle schools.

Archive >