The Distinguished Teaching Prize was established in 2009 as a collaboration between the Provost’s office and the Center for the Advancement of Teaching. At that time, $1,000 was awarded to up to three faculty members to recognize overall excellence in teaching. From 2009-2016, 25 winners in 12 departments were awarded the prize. Notably, in 2015 the college named 6 winners rather than 3.

In 2016, the new Teaching & Learning Center, under the direction of Gina Rae Foster, revisited the prize guidelines and created a more rigorous and transparent selection process. Students were actively encouraged to nominate their instructors, and the review of nominee materials was expanded to include a range of faculty, staff, and student reviewers. From 2017-2022, 18 winners from 11 departments received the prize, and the number of nominations and nominees showed a remarkable increase. Undergraduate student nominations account for this remarkable growth.

In 2017, Allison Pease (now our current Provost) began recording podcast interviews with the prize winners, creating a library of teaching resources that Gina Rae Foster has continued since 2023. These recordings can be found on Spotify, YouTube, and the John Jay Distinguished Teaching website. 

Starting in 2019, former winners of the prize who had been nominated became eligible for consideration after at least 5 years between awards. These former winners were asked to demonstrate substantial development in their pedagogies since their first award. Four previous winners have had success in second selection processes under these criteria: Jillian Grose-Fifer, Psychology (2009, 2019), Crystal Endsley, Africana Studies (2015, 2021), Gregory Donaldson, Communication & Theatre Arts (2014, 2022), and Christen Madrazo, English (2016, 2024).

From 2023 to the present, the award has increased to $5,000 per winner. In this time, 6 winners from 4 departments have been recognized. Over time, more students have volunteered to review faculty submissions, and the number of departments and faculty reviewers has also expanded. With the number of eligible nominees often exceeding 100 instructors, the willingness of so many students and faculty to contribute their time to reviews has helped to maintain and increase the equity and depth of the selection process.

We believe that the extraordinary teaching across John Jay College is well represented by the number of departments whose faculty have won the prize in the past 16 years and by the more than 1,000 nominees, who are both full time and part time faculty, from EVERY academic program and department in the college. 

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