Cathy Davidson Receives New American Colleges and Universities Award

Distinguished Professor Cathy Davidson (English), director of the GC's Futures Initiative (FI), has been named the 2016 recipient of the New American Colleges and Universities- Ernest L. Boyer Award, which honors scholars who make significant contributions to higher education.

"I am deeply honored to receive the Boyer Award from NAC&U," Davidson said. "All of higher education demands a new form of liberal arts that integrates interdisciplinary thinking throughout the curriculum, in order to ensure the most expansive, diverse, multicultural education for the complex and changing world our students face today."

Davidson, a renowned scholar of cultural history and technology, has published more than 20 books and in 2011 was appointed by President Barack Obama to the National Council on the Humanities. Her current work focuses on trust, data, new collaborative methods of living and learning, and the ways we can change higher education for a better future.

The Futures Initiative, launched in fall 2014, fosters greater equity and innovation in higher education at every level of the GC, empowering the next generation of intellectual leaders with bold, public, and engaged teaching and learning.

Through HASTAC - a 14,000-member digital learning network that Davidson cofounded in 2002 - the initiative is extending its collaborative peer-to-peer practices across institutions, disciplines, national boundaries, and economic and social disparities.

"The Futures Initiative takes next-generation graduate training beyond the cutting edge," Davidson said. "And in an affordable fashion."