Read below for a sampling of awards and honors earned by NYU faculty in 2020-2021.


Fred Moten, Professor of Performance Studies at Tisch School of the Arts, was named a 2020 MacArthur Fellow by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Fred Moten

Fred Moten

Four faculty have been elected into the National Academy of Sciences:

  • Marisa Carrasco, Silver Professor of Psychology & Neural Science, Faculty of Arts and Science
  • Yann LeCun, Silver Professor of Dara Science, Computer Science, Neural Science, and Electrical Engineering, Tandon School of Engineering/Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences
  • Kathryn J. Moore, Jean and David Blechman Professor of Cardiology and Professor of Cell Biology, School of Medicine
  • Adam Przeworski, Professor of Politics, Faculty of Arts and Science

Anna Harvey, Professor of Politics in FAS and Affiliated Professor of Data Science and Law, has been named president and CEO of the Social Sciences Research Council.

Anna Harvey

Anna Harvey

Three NYU faculty have been named to appointments in the Biden administration:

  • Lily Batchelder, Robert C. Kopple Family Professor of Taxation in the School of Law, will be Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy in the Treasury Department
  • David Hayes, Adjunct Professor of Law at the School of Law, will be Special Assistant to the President for Climate Policy
  • Lisa Monaco, Distinguished Senior Fellow, Law and Security, and
    Cybersecurity Adjunct Professor of Law, will be Deputy Attorney General
Two Tandon School faculty members have received NSF CAREER Awards:
  • Anna Choromanska, Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering
  • Christopher Musco, Assistant Professor of Computer Science and
    Engineering
Sonali McDermid

Sonali McDermid

Kyunghyun Cho

Kyunghyun Cho

Ned Block

Ned Block

Stuart Wurtzel

Stuart Wurtzel

Sonali McDermid, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies in FAS, has received an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

Kyunghyun Cho, Associate Professor of Computer Science and Data Science at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, has won the Samsung Ho-Am Prize in Engineering.

Ned Block, Silver Professor of Philosophy, Psychology, and Neural Science at FAS, has won the 2021 Lebowitz Prize for Philosophical Achievement and Contribution, along with Ian Phillips, a philosopher at Johns Hopkins University.

Stuart Wurtzel, Adjunct Instructor of Design for stage and film at the Tisch School, received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2021 Art Directors Guild Awards.

Six faculty members have been chosen as winners of the 2020-21 Distinguished Teaching Awards.

  • Chiye Aoki, Professor of Neural Science and Biology, College of Arts and
    Science
  • Jennifer Hill, Professor of Applied Statistics and Data Science, Steinhardt
    School
  • Alexander Kerr, Clinical Professor, Department of Oral and Maxillofacial
    Pathology, Radiology, and Medicine, College of Dentistry
  • Amal Shehata, Associate Clinical Professor of Accounting, Stern School
  • Adam Skolnick, associate professor of medicine, Grossman School of
    Medicine
  • Janet Zarish, Associate Arts Professor, Tisch School

Susan Murray, Professor of Media, Culture, and Communication in the Steinhardt School, has been awarded a 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

Robert Glasper, Adjunct Instructor at the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, won a Grammy Award for Best R&B Song for Better Than I Imagine.

Enrique Rojas, Assistant Professor of Biology at FAS, has received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award.

Wei Ji Ma, Professor of Neural Science and Psychology at FAS, has won the Jeffrey L. Elman Prize for Scientific Achievement and Community Building from the Cognitive Science Society.

Susan Murray

Susan Murray

Robert Glasper

Robert Glasper

Wei Ji Ma

Wei Ji Ma

Two NYU faculty were named Alfred P. Sloan Fellows:

  • Elena Manresa, Assistant Professor of Economics at FAS
  • David Schneider, Assistant Professor in the Center for Neural Science
Theordore Rappaport, David Lee/Ernst Weber Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Tandon School, Professor of Computer Science at the Courant Institute, Professor of Radiology at the Grossman School of Medicine, and the founding director of the research center NYU WIRELESS, has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering.
Deborah Archer

Deborah Archer

Celine Gounder

Celine Gounder

Deborah Archer, Jacob K. Javits Professor and Professor of Clinical Law, was elected President of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

Celine Gounder, Clinical Assistant Professor at the Grossman School of Medicine, has been named to the group of 13 public health experts who will make up President-elect Biden’s coronavirus advisory board.

Terrance Hayes, Artist-in-Residence at the Creative Writing Program, received the biennial Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry from the Library of Congress for his 2018 poetry collection, ​American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin.​

Joel Spencer, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics and Computer Science at the Courant Institute, won the 2021 Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition from the American Mathematical Society for his co-authored 1992 book, T​he Probabilistic Method.​

Michael Lindsey

Michael Lindsey

Lala Straussner

Lala Straussner

Vincent Guilamo-Ramos

Vincent Guilamo-Ramos

Michael A. Lindsey, Constance and Martin Silver Professor of Poverty Studies at the Silver School of Social Work, received the University of Pittsburgh’s Larry E. Davis Award for Excellence in Race Research. In December, he was elected a 2021 Fellow of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.

Lala Straussner, Professor in the Silver School of Social Work, has been named a Fellow of the Israeli National Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Vincent Guilamo-Ramos, Professor in the Silver School of Social Work, was inducted to the American Academy of Nursing’s 2020 Class of Fellows.

Two NYU faculty at the Tandon School of Engineering were named to the National Academy of Inventors:

  • Jin Kim Montclare, Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
  • Daniel Sodickson, Professor of Biomedical Engineering

The Steinhardt School's Ikuko Acosta, Clinical Associate Professor of Art and Art Professions and Marygrace Berberian, Clinical Assistant Professor of Art Therapy, are the 2020 recipients of the Rawley Silver Research Award from the American Art Therapy Association.

Kristie Patten

Kristie Patten, Associate Professor of Occupational Therapy at the Steinhardt School, won the American Occupational Therapy Association’s Eleanor Clarke Slagle Lectureship Award, the highest honor in her field.

Howard Rosenthal, Professor of Politics in FAS, has won the Career Achievement Award, the highest honor bestowed by the Society of Political Methodology.

Four members of the faculty were recognized with NYU's Making a Difference Awards, presented biennially to members of the NYU community who have made a positive impact on the world through scholarship and advocacy:

  • Elise Cappella, Associate Professor of Applied Psychology, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development
  • Jacob William Faber, Associate Professor of Sociology and Public
    Service, FAS and the Wagner Graduate School of Public Service
  • Lorel Burns, Assistant Professor of Endodontics, College of Dentistry
  • Cheryline Pezzullo, Clinical Assistant Professor of Cariology and Comprehensive Care, College of Dentistry
Kwame Anthony Appiah

Kwame Anthony Appiah

Kwame Anthony Appiah, Professor of Philosophy and Law at FAS and the School of Law, has received the Getty Medal, established by the J. Paul Getty Trust to recognize contributions to the arts and humanities.

Two NYU faculty members earned 2020 Tony Award nominations:

  • Oskar Eustis, Arts Professor at Tisch School of the Arts, as a Producer of Best Play nominee Sea Wall/A Life
  • Allen Lee Hughes, Associate Arts Professor at Tisch, as Best Lighting Designer for A Soldier's Play
Christopher Flinn

Christopher Flinn

Alfred Galichon

Alfred Galichon

Thomas Phillippon

Thomas Philippon

Three faculty members were named 2020 Fellows of the Econometric Society:

  • Christopher Flinn, Professor of Economics, FAS
  • Alfred Galichon, Professor of Economics, FAS and Professor of Mathematics, Courant
  • Thomas Philippon, Max L. Heine Professor of Finance, Stern School of Business.
Eric Vanden-Eijnden, Professor of Mathematics at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, has been named a Vannevar Bush Faculty Fellow by the Department of Defense.

Two faculty members have been named 2020 Pew Scholars and will receive four years of funding to invest in foundational research:

  • Carlos Carmona-Fontaine, Assistant Professor of Biology, FAS
  • Gilad Evrony, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and of Neuroscience and Physiology, Grossman School of Medicine

Two faculty members have been named Woodrow Wilson Fellows by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation:

  • Kwami Coleman, Assistant Professor in Musicology, Gallatin School of Individualized Study
  • Elizabeth Ellis, Assistant Professor of History, FAS
Kwami Coleman

Kwami Coleman

Elizabeth Ellis

Elizabeth Ellis