Awards
Celebrating Excellence Across the MAA Community
The MAA Awards are presented each year to acknowledge our members' remarkable contributions to the MAA community and the field of mathematics. The award ceremony, held at MathFest, is a joyful celebration of our diverse and dynamic community and the incredible talent shaping the future of math.
Teaching Awards
Awarded For: Teaching effectiveness that has been shown to have influenced the honoree’s own institutions. Up to three awards are handed out yearly, and individuals may only win once.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $1,000, partial support for travel to MAA MathFest, and a certificate of recognition
Recent Winners: (2025)
Monique Chyba, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa
Angie Hodge-Zickerman, Northern Arizona University
Yvonne Lai, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: August 1
Awarded For: Distinguished teaching by a beginning mathematics faculty member
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $1,000 and up to $1,000 of MAA MathFest travel reimbursed
Recent Winners: (2025)
Elizabeth Arnold, Colorado State University
Sarah Klanderman, Marian University
Shanise Walker, Clark Atlanta University
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Middle and high school mathematics teachers who have done outstanding work to motivate students in mathematics by participating in the MAA American Mathematics Competitions (AMC).
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $500 and free registration, housing, and travel expenses to MAA MathFest
Nomination Guidelines & Past Winners
Nomination Due: October 1
Research and Service Awards
Awarded For: Extraordinarily successful service to mathematics. It is the most prestigious award for service offered by the MAA
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $5,000
Recent Winner: (2025)
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Significant, sustained work to broaden access to mathematics and advance MAA’s core value of inclusivity
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $2,500
Recent Winner: (2024)
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Bringing mathematical ideas and information to nonmathematical audiences
Prizes: $2,000
Recent Winner:
Eugenia Cheng (2025)
Nomination Guidelines & Past Winners
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Special work of service associated with mathematics or the wider mathematical community. Awarded intermittently, when appropriate for recognition of outstanding service
Prizes: Certificate of Recognition
Nomination Due: April 1
Awarded For: Significant, sustained work to develop leadership within the mathematical sciences, cultivating and strengthening leadership skills among the next generation of math leaders.
Awarded Annually
Prize: $5,000
Recent Winner: (2025)
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: The Certificate of Meritorious Service is to be presented for service at the national level or for service to a Section of the Association.
Awarded Annually
Recent Winners: (2025)
John Bukowski, Juniata College
Karen Clark, The College of New Jersey
Dr. Minah Oh, James Madison University
Ronald (Ron) G. Smith, Harding University
Violeta Vasilevska, Utah Valley University
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Distinguished contributions to the mathematical education of K-16 students by a mathematician, statistician, or mathematics educator.
Prize: $5,000
Recent Winner: (2025)
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: Outstanding mathematical research by undergraduate students
A Joint Award Given Annually by the MAA, AMS, and SIAM
Prizes: $1,200
Recent Winner:
Kenta Suzuki, MIT (2025)
Nomination Guidelines & Past Winners
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: A significant record of published research in undergraduate mathematics education by an early-career researcher
Awarded Biennially
Prizes: $1,500
Recent Winner: (2024)
Nomination Guidelines & Past Winners
Nomination Due: October 1
Writing Awards
Awarded For: Made to authors of expository articles published in Mathematics Magazine.
Up to two awards annually
Prizes: $1,000
Recent Winners: (2025)
Jeffrey D. Blanchard and Marc Chamberland (2024).
Salvaging College Registrations During COVID-19 via Integer Programming. Mathematics Magazine, 97(2), 167–180. https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2022.2089472
William Q. Erickson (2024).
The Break Buddy Problem. Mathematics Magazine, 97(2), 194–199. https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2024.2312800
Awarded For: A noteworthy expository or survey paper. The pool of eligible papers shall be limited to expository or survey articles published in North American journals, and also all chapters in anthologies published by the Association, such as the books in the Studies series.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $1,000 and certificate
Recent Winner: (2025)
Jordan S. Ellenberg (2021). Geometry, Inference, Complexity, and Democracy. Bulletin (New Series) of the American Mathematical Society, 58(1), 55 – 77, https://doi.org/10.1090/bull/1708.
Awarded For: A noteworthy expository paper appearing in an Association publication, at least one of whose authors is a younger mathematician, generally under the age of forty.
Awarded Biannually
Prizes: $1,000 and certificate
Recent Winner: 2023
Ne’Kiya Jackson & Calcea Johnson (2024) Five or Ten New Proofs of the Pythagorean Theorem, The American Mathematical Monthly, 131:9, 739-752, DOI: 10.1080/00029890.2024.2370240
Awarded For: Presented to an author or authors of an exceptional article that is accessible to undergraduates and published during the preceding year in Math Horizons.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $1,000
Recent Winners: (2025)
Kristen Mazur, Mutiara Sondjaja, Matthew Wright & Carolyn Yarnall (2024).. Illuminating Illustration: Interesting Intersections and Helly’s Theorem, Math Horizons, 32:1, 8-11.
Awarded For: Given for articles of expository excellence published in The College Mathematics Journal.
Up to two awards each year
Prizes: $1,000
Recent Winners: (2025)
Tova Brown & Brody Johnson (2024).
Pull-Back Cars: Vehicles for the Instruction of Differential Equations, The College Mathematics Journal, 55:3, 192-204. DOI: 10.1080/07468342.2024.2302300
Jason Snyder (2024).
A Modern Spin on Archimedes’ Quadrature of the Parabola, The College Mathematics Journal, 55:2, 134-139. DOI: 10.1080/07468342.2023.227899
Awarded For: Recognizes authors of articles of expository excellence published in The American Mathematical Monthly.
Up to four awards each year
Prizes: $1,000
Recent Winners: (2025)
Mario Gómez & Facundo Mémoli (2024).
The Four Point Condition: An Elementary Tropicalization of Ptolemy’s Inequality, The American Mathematical Monthly, 131:3, 187-203. DOI: 10.1080/00029890.2023.2285695
Donald Teets (2024).
Lagrange Points and the James Webb Space Telescope, The American Mathematical Monthly, 131:4, 309-318. DOI: 10.1080/00029890.2023.2298161
Will Traves & David Wehlau (2024).
Ten Points on a Cubic, The American Mathematical Monthly, 131:2, 112-130. DOI: 10.1080/00029890.2023.2274240
Adrian Rice (2024).
“The Riddle of the Ages”: James Joseph Sylvester and the Transcendence of π, The American Mathematical Monthly, 131:6, 463-478. DOI:10.1080/00029890.2024.2322944
Awarded For: Honors the author or authors of a paper reporting on novel research in algebra, combinatorics, or discrete mathematics. Papers are judged on quality of research, clarity of exposition, and accessibility to undergraduates.
Awarded every three years.
Prize: $5,000
Recent Winner: 2023
Samantha Dahlberg, Angèle Foley, and Stephanie van Willigenburg
Resolving Stanley’s e-positivity of claw-contractible-free graphs,
Eur. Math. Soc., (JEMS) 22(8), (2020), 2673-2696.
doi.org/10.4171/JEMS/974
Awarded For: Intended to recognize the author(s) of a distinguished, innovative book published by the MAA and to encourage the writing of such books.
The Committee determines the awarding schedule.
Prizes: $2,500
Recent Winner: (2025)
Alsina, C., & Nelsen, R. B. (2023). A panoply of polygons (Vol. 58). American Mathematical Society
Awarded For: Intended to recognize authors of exceptionally well-written books with a positive impact on the public’s view of mathematics and to encourage the writing of such books. Eligible books include mathematical monographs at the undergraduate level, histories, biographies, works of fiction, poetry, collections of essays, and works on mathematics as it is related to other areas of arts and sciences.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $2,000
Recent Winner: (2025)
Ismar Volíc, Wellesley College
Making Democracy Count: How Mathematics Improves Voting, Electoral Maps, and Representation, Princeton University Press (2024)
Awarded For: Recognizes the author or authors of undergraduate mathematics teaching materials.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $2,500
Recent Winner: (2025)
David Austin, Understanding Linear Algebra, 2023. https://understandinglinearalgebra.org/home.html
Nomination Due: October 1