Columbia faculty, students, and staff are on the cutting edge of advancements in all fields and their work is fittingly awarded and recognized. Below, find the most recent accomplishments and milestones as well as monthly lists of recent awards.
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Recent Awards & Milestones
Pardlo won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry this week for his second book of poems, Digest.
Columbia professors in disciplines such as classics, sociology, music and writing were awarded Guggenheim Fellowships for 2015.
Columbia awarded its first Global Freedom of Expression Prizes to courts in Turkey and Zimbabwe and to a U.K.-based legal services organization in recognition of their contributions to free speech and a free press.
Columbia University’s inaugural Global Freedom of Expression Prizes were awarded on March 11 to the Constitutional Court of Turkey, the Constitutional Court of Zimbabwe and the Media Legal Defence Initiative (MLDI).
Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger reflects on the inaugural Global Freedom of Expression Prizes, which recognize the best judicial decisions and legal representation around the world in advancing international legal norms and principles of freedom of expression.
Stathis Gourgouris, a professor of classics, English and comparative literature who directs the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society, believes that antiquity has relevance to contemporary life.
Liza Knapp (GSAS’85), an associate professor of Slavic languages, focuses her teaching and research on 19th century Russian literature, in particular the novels of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. A native New Yorker, she began studying Russian as a teenager, inspired by her reading of the literature in translation.
Asked what makes a good teacher or good student, Molly Murray (CC’94) responds simply, “Curiosity … an openness to new ideas and a willingness to follow them where they lead, into the library or out of it.”
Patricia Dailey, an associate professor of English and comparative literature, specializes in medieval literature and critical theory, adapting her teaching style to individual classes.
As an undergraduate at Purdue University, Brad Garton majored in pharmacy because “growing up in the Midwest, being a musician wasn’t a legitimate job.”
Physics professor Brian Cole is renowned for Accelerated Physics, his two-semester course for first-year students that covers the usual introductory physics sequence, plus relativity, waves and introductory quantum mechanics. “An honors physics course on steroids,” he calls it.
Great teachers are passionate about the classroom, as evidenced by the 11 faculty members honored this year with Lenfest Distinguished Teaching Awards.