Awards


Two Marilyn Sternglass Awards are offered annually on the basis of merit:

Marilyn Sternglass Writing Award

(for writing submitted in a L&L graduate course, $500)

Marilyn Sternglass Overall Merit Award

(for matriculated L&L graduate students, $500)


Memorial Tribute for Marilyn Sternglass: 1932-2004.

Marilyn Sternglass died of natural causes on January 6th, 2004.

Formerly on faculty at three well-known universities, Marilyn came to City College in 1985, where she remained until her retirement in 1996. During her years at CCNY, Marilyn reconceived and rebuilt the department’s MA in Pedagogy–renaming it “Master of Arts in Language and Literacy.”  In part to support this program, she lobbied successfully for obtaining several additional faculty lines. She then participated in hiring and mentoring the new professors.

As a member of the English Department, Marilyn routinely taught introductory writing courses and participated in related workshops and committees.  During the early 1990s, she produced a series of critical reading and writing textbooks that were published by Macmillan; during these same years, Marilyn pursued a six-year study of fifty-three college students and of the various influences on their academic lives. This groundbreaking research culminated in a highly acclaimed book entitled Time to Know Them, published by Laurence Erlbaum in 1997.

Time to Know Them demonstrates the value of longitudinal research for learning about public college commuter students and their evolution as writers.  The key argument is that students entering college as remedial writers do acquire academic literacy as they proceed through several years of college–and that we need to look beyond the first-year writing course to understand undergraduate student writers.  Having quickly earned national attention, Time to Know Them won two prestigious awards:  the Mina Shaughnessy Award from the Modern Language Association and the CCCC Outstanding Book Award from the National Council of Teachers of English.   As Marilyn saw it, Time to Know Them was a defense of open admissions policies and programs as well as a partial response to James Traub’s critique of CCNY.

After retiring from City College in 1996, Marilyn made fifteen conference presentations as an invited speaker, published six journal articles, and served as consultant for a FIPSE project –in addition to writing Time to Know Them. During these years, she generously continued to mentor many former students and younger colleagues–as she had been doing throughout her professional life.

A Language and Literacy MA Memorial Prize Fund was established by Marilyn Sternglass’s husband Ernest Sternglass  and her adult children, Dan Sternglass and Susan Noble, in October 2004.  These awards are the Marilyn Sternglass Overall Merit Award and the Marilyn Sternglass Writing Award.


Former Recipients:

AY 2020-2021

MS Overall Merit Award

Marcel Aguayo

Jorge I. Velez

MS Writing Award

Claire Balani

Valerie Smith

AY 2019-2020

MS Overall Merit Award

Brittany Zayas

MS Writing Award

Grace Kearney

Maria Qureshi

AY 2018-2019

MS Overall Merit Award

Sahib Kaur

MS Writing Award

Marina Palenyy

Honorable Mention

Allison Moorhead

Stephen Perry

AY 2017-2018

MS Overall Merit Award

Javid Buchman

MS Writing Award

Michael Rymer

AY 2016-2017

MS Overall Merit Award
Sokuntary Svay

MS Writing Award

Dominick Gregory

AY 2015-2016

MS Overall Merit Award

Maria Vint

MS Writing Award

Dominick Gregory

Sokuntary Svay

AY 2014-2015

MS Overall Merit Award

Sofia Binioris

Stephanie Jean

 MS Writing Award

Sokunthary Svay

Maria Vint

AY 2013-2014

MS Overall Merit Award

Jennifer Buno

MS Writing Award

Sofia Binioris

Karen Mooney 

AY 2012-2013

MS Overall Merit Award

Nargiza Matyakubova

Robert Ramos

MS Writing Award

Jessica Newman 

AY 2010-2011

MS Overall Merit Award

Viktoriia Dudar

MS Writing Award

Viktoriia Dudar

AY 2009-2010

MS Overall Merit Award

Wynne Ferdinand

MS Writing Award

Alexandra Reihing

AY 2008-2009

MS Overall Merit Award

MS Writing Award

AY 2007-2008

MS Overall Merit Award

Philip Fisher

MS Writing Award

Lauren Ball

AY 2006-2007

MS Overall Merit Award

Toni L. D’Onofrio

John Lyons

MS Writing Award

Michael Burns