Awards, Feb 26, 2009

The following awards have been presented for work in advocacy, fund raising, nonprofit leadership, philanthropy, and other areas:

Education fund raising. The Council for Advancement and Support of Education (Washington) has presented the 2009 Independent Schools Awards to individuals and foundations that have enhanced primary and secondary education. The awards and their recipients:

— The John R. Chandler Award for corporations or foundations: Thomas B. and Elizabeth M. Sheridan Foundation (Hunt Valley, Md.)

— The Robert Bell Crow Memorial Award for development professionals: Kathleen Hanson, former assistant head and vice president for advancement and external affairs at the Baylor School (Chattanooga, Tenn.)

— The Seymour Preston Award for trustees: William D. Green, chair of the Board of Trustees at Newark Academy (Livingston, N.J.)

— The Support Staff Distinguished Award for nonprofessional development staff members: Barbara Backman, gifts administrator at Miss Porter’s School (Farmington, Conn.)

Family foundations. The Council on Foundations (Washington) has announced the recipients of the Critical Impact Award, which recognizes innovative projects supported by family foundations. The winning organizations and projects:

— The Colina Foundation (Southgate, Mich.), for its efforts to prepare children for kindergarten by providing families and caretakers with resources that aid early-childhood development.

— The Hulda B. and Maurice L. Rothschild Foundation (Chicago), for its work to transform the culture of aging in nursing homes.

— The Walton Family Foundation, for its efforts to improve the quality of life for residents of the Delta Region of Arkansas and Mississippi by working with regional organizations on economic-development strategies.

Humanities. The Grawemeyer Foundation at the U. of Louisville (Ky.) has announced the recipients of the 2009 Grawemeyer Awards, which were presented in five categories. Each recipient receives a $200,000 honorarium. The award in religion is given jointly with the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. The winners:

— Education. Paul Attewell and David Lavin, professors of sociology at the City U. of New York’s Graduate Center, for their book Passing the Torch: Does Higher Education for the Disadvantaged Pay Off Across the Generations?, which argues that open-enrollment policies are economically beneficial not only to those who are able to attend college because of such policies but to their children as well.

— Ideas for improving world order. Michael Johnson, a professor of political sciences at Colgate U. (Hamilton, N.Y.), for his book Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and Democracy, which asserts that corruption takes different forms depending on a country’s political and economic patterns.

— Music composition. Frank Peter Zimmerman, a violinist, for his four-movement concerto titled “The Lost Art of Letter Writing.”

— Psychology. Anne Treisman, professor of psychology at Princeton U. (N.J.), for her work in identifying how the brain processes visual features and links them together.

— Religion. Donald Shriver Jr., former president of Union Theological Seminary (New York), for his book Honest Patriots: Loving a Country Enough to Remember Its Misdeeds, which argues that the United States has never adequately faced or tried to repair the damage from its national wrongdoings.