Association for Women in Mathematics Service Award 2017

The Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) presented Katie Kavanagh, Michelle Manes, Maura Mast and Marie Vitulli with AWM Service Awards at the AWM Reception and Awards Presentation held during the Joint Mathematics Meetings in Atlanta, GA, January 4-7, 2017. The AWM Service Award, established by the AWM Executive Committee (EC) in November 2012, recognizes individuals for helping to promote and support women in mathematics through exceptional voluntary service to the Association for Women in Mathematics. The award is given annually to a select group of AWM volunteers in recognition of their extensive time and effort devoted to AWM activities during the previous seven years. Presidents (past, present, and -elect) and current officers are not eligible for the award.

Katie (Fowler) Kavanagh, Clarkson University is recognized for her active involvement as chair of the AWM Student Chapters Committee since 2012. In her role as committee chair, Katie was instrumental in reviving the committee and setting up new processes for the AWM to stay connected with its student chapters. She worked closely with the AWM President to set up the first Webinar with the Student Chapters. Katie handled student chapter submissions for the student chapter corner of the Newsletter, a new initiative that started during her term as chair of the student chapter committee. She has organized student participation at the MAA MathFest, including the poster session at the MathFest 100 in 2015 which was very successful.

Michelle Manes, University of Hawaii is recognized for her active involvement with the AWM on several fronts. She serves as chair of the JMM Committee, a subcommittee of the AWM Meetings Committee, and has organized the AWM Panel at JMM for the last 2 years. She has been very active in helping to get the processes for the new ADVANCE grant working. She serves as chair of the (new) committee to create new networks, drafting a call for proposals to the math community and handling the communications with and submissions from new networks. She also serves on the committee to help established research networks get organized to create web pages, steering committees and email lists.

Maura Mast, Fordham University is recognized for her active involvement with the AWM on several fronts. In 2012, two years after finishing 8 years of service as Clerk of the AWM, Maura was elected for a four-year term to again serve on the AWM Executive Committee (EC). She served as the AWM representatives to the Joint Committee on Women in the Mathematical Sciences (JCW) for 7 years (2006 through 2012). She was an active member of the Meetings Portfolio the four years she was on the EC as a member-at-large. In particular, she served as chair of the MathFest sub-committee. Before that Maura was the main force behind organizing the AWM panels held at MathFest. During her years of service to the AWM Maura has been a regular volunteer for staffing the AWM booth at MathFest and JMM. She is currently co-chairing the AWM Fund Development Committee.

Marie Vitulli, University of Oregon is recognized for her active involvement with the AWM on several fronts. Marie served on the AWM Executive Committee (EC) as a member-at-large for 6 years. As chair of the Policy and Advocacy Portfolio she was very active and involved in creating statements and policies for the organization. She currently serves on the AWM Financial Oversight and Investment Committee. For several years Marie has been volunteering to help the treasurer with budget preparation and analysis. She has been active in the process of identifying a new database system for the AWM. Even though Marie has finished her term on the EC (January 2016) she does almost daily posts on our Facebook page to promote AWM and issues related to our mission. In addition, she is an active proponent of better representation of women in mathematics on Wikipedia, and she maintains a Women in Mathematics site.