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: (2026)
Karl-Dieter Crisman, Gordon College
James Sellers, University of Minnesota Duluth
Matthew Morena, Christopher Newport University
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: (2026)
Alexander Barrios, University of St. Thomas
Claudio Gómez-Gonzáles, Carleton College
Dr. Hwayeon Ryu, Elon 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: (2026)
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: October 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: (2026)
Guidelines and Nomination Form
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: The Meritorious Service Award is to be presented for service at the national level or for service to a Section of the Association.
Awarded Annually
Recent Winners: (2026)
Annalisa Crannell, Professor Emerita of Franklin & Marshall College
Brittney Miller, Coe College
Janet Liou-Mark, In Memoriam
James Sellers, University of Minnesota Duluth
Jennifer Quinn, Professor Emerita of University of Washington Tacoma
Laura Watkins, Glendale Community College
Nomination Due: April 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: (2026)
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: (2026)
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: (2026)
Timothy Y. Chow
Timothy Y. Chow, “Cooking Poisons: Thinking Laterally with Game Theory,”
Mathematics Magazine 98, no. 5 (2025): 405-411. https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2025.2555157.
Thomas Sibley
Thomas Q. Sibley, “Comparing Convexity Measures,” Mathematics Magazine 98, no. 3 (2025): 162-174. https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2025.2495526.
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: (2026)
Geordie Williamson
“Is Deep Learning a Useful Tool for the Pure Mathematician?” Bulletin (New
Series) of the American Mathematical Society 61, no. 2 (April 2024): 271-286.
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: (2026)
Jeremy Siegert
“Abbott Dimension: Mathematics Inspired by Flatland,” American
Mathematical Monthly 131, no. 2 (2024): 145-161.
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: (2026)
Ari Cruz, Bruce Fang, Pamela E. Harris & J. Carlos Martínez Mori
“Parking Towards √2, One Fraction at a Time,” Math Horizons 33, no. 1
(2025): 5–9. https://doi.org/10.1080/10724117.2025.2504268.
Awarded For: Given for articles of expository excellence published in The College Mathematics Journal.
Up to two awards each year
Prizes: $1,000Recent Winners: (2026)
Greg Dresden
“Epitrochoids and Hypotrochoids Together Again.” The College Mathematics Journal 56, no. 3 (2025): 203-213. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10 80/07468342.2024.2388009.
Angel Carrillo, Jonathan Cervantes, Mike Krebs, and Francisco Leon
“A Graph Theorist Plants a Tree.” The College Mathematics Journal 56, no. 1
(2025): 42-48. https://doi.org/10.1080/07468342.2024.2377007.
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: (2026)
Christopher Donnay and Matthew Kahle
“Asymptotics of Redistricting the n x n Grid.” The American Mathematical
Monthly 132, no. 9 (2025): 856-866. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2025.2 542711.
Tim Chartier
“Sports Analytics Double Take: The Need for Multiple Perspectives on Data.”
The American Mathematical Monthly 132, no. 1 (2025): 63-76. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2024.2410144.
Joseph W. Dauben
“The Mathematics of Crossword Puzzles: In Celebration of Karen Hunger
Parshall.” The American Mathematical Monthly 132, no. 6 (2025): 479-500.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2025.2477437.
Noah Giansiracusa
“Uncovering the Euclidean Geometry of Data.” The American Mathematical
Monthly 132, no. 1 (2025): 26-34.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2024.240 9614.
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: (2026)
Carrie Diaz Eaton, Allison Henrich, Steven Klee, and Jennifer Townsend
Navigating the Math Major: Charting Your Course. Vol. 73. American
Mathematical Society, 2024.
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: (2026)
Stéphane Douady, Jacques Dumais, Christophe Golé, and Nancy Pick
Do Plants Know Math? Unwinding the Story of Plant Spirals, from Leonardo da Vinci to Now (Princeton University Press, 2024).
Awarded For: Recognizes the author or authors of undergraduate mathematics teaching materials.
Awarded Annually
Prizes: $3,000
Recent Winner: (2026)
Annalisa Crannell, Marc Frantz, Fumiko Futamura
Perspective and Projective Geometry (Princeton University Press, 2019).
Nomination Due: October 1
Awarded For: The Mohammad K. Azarian Award seeks to recognize individuals who contribute to the advancement of mathematics through their exceptional ability to craft innovative problems featured in MAA publications and the robust world of AMC.
Awarded Annually
Recent Winner: (2026)
Rolando Seclén and Michael Elgersma
The American Mathematical Monthly 12446
Problem Proposal:
Problems and Solutions. The American Mathematical Monthly, 131(2),
170-180. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2024.2279472
Problem Solution:
Problems and Solutions. The American Mathematical Monthly, 132(9),
930-940. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2025.2542705
Honorable Mentions:
Warut Suksompong
Mathematics Magazine Quickie 1156
Problem Proposal:
Problems and Solutions. (2025). Mathematics Magazine, 98(5), 479-488.
https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2025.2589005
Problem Solution:
Problems and Solutions. (2025). Mathematics Magazine, 98(5), 479-488.
https://doi.org/10.1080/0025570X.2025.2589005
Winter Mascot
2025 American Invitational Mathematical Exam #15
Robert Foote and Gregory Galperin
The American Mathematical Monthly 12438
Problem Proposal: Problems and Solutions. The American Mathematical
Monthly, 131(1), 76-86. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2023.2266980
Problem Solution: Problems and Solutions. The American Mathematical
Monthly, 132(9), 930-940. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029890.2025.2542705