Deadline for nominations: June 1, 2026

• The annual AJHA Award for Excellence in Teaching honors a college or university teacher who excels at teaching in the areas of journalism and mass communication history, makes a positive impact on student learning, and offers an outstanding example for other educators.

  An honorarium of $500 accompanies the prize.

  Eligibility:

  A nominee may be tenured or untenured, and should hold either a full- or part-time appointment with a minimum of three years teaching experience at a college or university that confers an associate, baccalaureate or higher degree in journalism, mass communication, communication studies, or history as of the submission due date.

  All nominees must have responsibility for teaching the history of journalism and mass communication either as a stand-alone course or as part of a broader course.

  Nomination packets must include:

• Letter of nomination from the candidate that includes the following:

a. A summary of his/her teaching philosophy and how he/she designs courses or assignments to actualize that philosophy,
b. An example of how experience has improved his or her teaching over time,
c. and a discussion of how the impact of his or her teaching has become evident.

• Curriculum vitae
• A syllabus from a mass communication history course or a course that incorporates mass communication history.
• Three items that demonstrate teaching effectiveness. These may include assignment sheets, lesson plan or detailed lecture notes, PowerPoint presentation for a lecture, examples of student work along with the assignment sheet from which the work was created (anonymize the work if possible and obtain permission to submit from the student where copyright may be an issue).
• One letter of support from a colleague (peer or senior) or academic administrator.

Nominations should be sent to Education Chair Amy Lauters electronically as a PDF (one file).