ACS-CES Award for Incorporation of Sustainability Into Chemical Education
Award at a Glance
Purpose
To recognize those individuals or groups who have made exemplary contributions to the incorporation of sustainability into chemical education.
Description
The American Chemical Society’s mission is to “Advance the broader chemistry enterprise and its practitioners for the benefit of Earth and its people,” As part of the Society’s new campaign for a Sustainable Future Strategic Initiative, a desired outcome is to "create a future chemistry enterprise workforce trained in sustainability concepts to revolutionize the discipline." This includes goals that "ACS will work with educators, students, researchers, and industry to modernize the chemistry curriculum to include sustainable development, circularity, green chemistry, and life cycle thinking."
These awards seek to recognize those individuals or groups who have made exemplary contributions to this important work. A goal of this recognition program is to facilitate dissemination of important ways in which educators are creatively incorporating sustainability, UN SDGs, green chemistry, and/or systems thinking into their classroom and outreach programs. Therefore, awardees will be expected to present invited talks on their work as part of a symposium at a selected conference.
It is anticipated that four to six different projects will be nationally recognized. In addition, each awardee will receive $1200 toward travel costs of attending the meeting.
Eligibility
Both third party and self-nominations are encouraged. Nominations should clearly demonstrate how the nominee or nominees have contributed to the effective incorporation of sustainability into chemical education. The target audience for the work can be one or more of the following: K-12 students, K-12 teachers, undergraduate students, graduate students, or the general public.
Nominations will be evaluated on the broad criteria of innovation, intellectual merit, and potential for broader impact. Additional important considerations include the extent to which sustainability is an important component of the education work, the extent to which the work supports learning of chemistry, and the overall quality of the design of the nominated work.
Award winners may select to have their material shared with educators nationally and internationally.
Deadline
September 30, 2025 at 11:59 p.m. ET
How to Apply
Use the Nominate Button to the side to submit a nomination. Completed nominations or self-nominations must include the following information:
- Full contact information (mailing address, phone number, email address).
- A title and abstract of no more than 150 words.
- A statement of no more than 500 words regarding the learning objective(s) for the work nominated, the target audience, and how sustainability has been incorporated.
- No more than 10 pages of supporting material (lab handout, class activity handout, descriptive materials, etc.).
Submission of materials for consideration will be viewed as a commitment by the individual or group to give a presentation at the ACS Meeting if the work submitted is selected for recognition, and to allow the presentation to be posted on the ACS website.
Sponsor
ACS Committee on Environment and Sustainability
Past Recipients
Contact Information
Questions about the recognition program can be directed to:
Dr. Jane Wissinger
CES Awards Program Chair
Email: jwiss@umn.edu
Phone: 612-625-9586
