Project on the elements of Finnish culture and education contributing to high rates of student success in mathematics. As a mathematics teacher in Brooklyn, Knowles is acutely aware of the obstacles her students face, including: a social disconnect from school in general, and mathematics in particular; lack of self confidence, nutrition and exercise; low levels of literacy; and a series of responsibilities outside of school that make academic achievement difficult. Her Roth-Thomson Award helped Knowles complete her research on Finnish institutional policies, governmental and non-profit mathematics programs.
Awardee Database
Awardees
Lindsay Whorton
Project on how teachers’ unions participate in and impact the education policy-making process in Finland. Whorton focused on the involvement of teachers’ unions in reforming compensation packages, in part as the role of labor relations in K-12 education reform is an area of growing controversy in the U.S. Her Roth-Thomson Award helped fund the translation into English of documents bearing upon relationships between policy-makers and teachers’ unions in Finland.
Julia Walters
In recognition of her work as a Senior Program Officer in the Office of English Language Programs of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. In particular, Walters won the award for invigorating and modernizing English language programs by recruiting and supporting top English Language Fellows and English Teaching Assistants who serve abroad, and for her cultural sensitivity, integrity and generosity. Walters died soon after receiving this award; in her memory, the Roth Foundation contributed her prize to her daughter’s education fund. (Julia Walters Obituary)
George Beukes
In recognition of his work in Windhoek, Namibia, where he developed programs to destigmatize HIV/AIDS, reduce discrimination against disabled youth, build gender equality, and roll back pervasive anti-Americanism. Beukes has had a positive, long-term impact on how the U.S. Embassy approaches cultural and educational programming in Namibia.
Anna Oreshkova
For her translation of Cheat and Charmer, by Pulitzer Prize laureate Elizabeth Frank.
Lubomir Nikolov
For his translation of The Sense of an Ending, by Julian Barnes.
Harold Varmus
In the third annual Fulbright Legacy Lectures, Harold Varmus spoke on “International Relations in Science and Medicine” at Kings College London, Edinburgh University and Pembroke College Oxford, where Senator J. William Fulbright studied from 1924-48. His talks expanded and elaborated upon themes discussed in his book, The Art and Politics of Science. Dr. Varmus is Director of the National Cancer Institute and a Nobel prize laureate.
Nicholas Richard
For his groundbreaking translation of Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker, which he entitled Enig marcheur. Hoban, who died in December 2011, was known for the spectrum of genres in which he wrote, including a very popular children’s series. Riddley Walker, his award-winning 1980 science fiction novel, presents a particular challenge to the translator, as its first-person narration is conducted in a language Hoban created. Nicolas Richard has translated work by a range of American authors, including Philip K. Dick, Hunter S. Thompson, Richard Brautigan and Thomas Pynchon.
J. Nicholas Napoli
Research project on “Trust, Industry, and Justice” at the Certosa di San Martino, a unique historic monument in Naples, to be conducted in the Italian Architectural Drawings and Photograph Collection at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts of the National Gallery.
Christa Vogelius
Project on the Danish-American literary press and transnational identity, beginning when Americans “discovered” Scandinavia through international travel at the end of the 19th-century. Her Roth Foundation award will help Vogelius complete her research for scholarly articles and a book on the relations between the Danish literary press and American publishers.
Kerry Greaves
Project on the group of avant-garde Danish artists that coalesced around the journal Helhesten during the years of Nazi occupation and WWII. Greaves’ work debunks the theory that World War II sundered postwar European culture from pre-war avant-garde art movements. Her Roth Foundation award will help her undertake archival research required complete her dissertation, which will be the first major study of Helhesten and the first in-depth analysis on Danish art of the 1930s and 1940s in more than forty years.
Amanda Tasse
Project in neuro-cinematics, the study of perceptual processes in response to cinema. Tasse’s Roth Foundation award enabled her to travel to the University of Lapland and the Midnight Sun Film Festival for her research. She is at the University of Southern California.
Alex Latu
Studies in administrative and constitutional law, towards earning a Master of Law degree at New York University Law School. Latu is interested in developing new legal structures to use in awarding and evaluating government contracts with private entities.
Katherine Edelen
Project on the relationship between environmental factors and social conflicts, undertaken at Norway’s Peace Research Institute in Oslo. Prior to going to Norway, Edelen had spent a year as an intern with the White House Task Force on Climate Change and Energy. Her Roth Foundation award enabled her to extend her data collection on water shortages and political conflict, with a Norwegian project in Bangladesh. Following this, she spent a year at Oxford as a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar in a Master’s program in Water Science, Policy and Management.
Elisa Maria Lopez
Project on the sociocultural impacts of renewable energy development among the Sami people, for a dissertation in anthropology at Columbia University.
Michelle Anne Urberg
Project entitled “Hystorie in Medieval Sweden: Musical Devotion, Nationalism and Brigittine Monasticism,” for a dissertation in musicology at the University of Chicago.
Thomas Pickering
Distinguished American senior statesman Ambassador Pickering spoke on the future of U.S. Middle East diplomacy at Pembroke College Oxford, Kings College London and Edinburgh University, in a talk entitled “From the Pillars of Hercules to the Hindu Kush.”
Bulgarian-English Writing Programs, 2012
Fellows: Philip Anastassiu, Garrard Conley, Nikolay Fenerski, Kathy Flann, Garth Greenwell, Delaney Nolan, Nikolay Petkov, Palmi Ranchev, Cab Tran, Bistra Velichkova
Philip Robinson
Project on architectural means to improve concert hall design, conducted at Aalto University. Robinson’s Roth Ednowment award enabled him to travel to undertake research into the acoustical properties of historic Finnish churches. He is at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
William Banks
Project: The selection, editing and translation of early 20th-century works by Georg Brandes, an influential Danish scholar and critic who wrote on national minorities, stateless people and the colonized. Banks is at the University of Wisconsin.
Margit Bowler
Project on linguistic quantifiers in Warlpiri, an aboriginal language spoken by 3,000 people in Australia’s Northern Territories. Bowler’s Roth Foundation award helped defray the costs of field work and data collection. She is a graduate of Reed College.
Jacques Mailhos
For his translation into French of environmentalist Edward Abbey’s non-fiction work, Desert Solitaire.
Pierre Demarty
For his translation into French of Paul Harding’s Tinkers (French title, Les Foudroyés). This second Coindreau prize in our 2012 program year reflects the shift of the annual award ceremony in Paris from December to June.
*The Prix Coindreau Prize, The Jeanne Varnay Pleasants Prize for Language Teaching, and the CASVA-Henry & Judith Millon Award are currently inactive.