Awards

NCTE Richard W. Halle Award

for Outstanding Middle Level Educator

2024 Award Recipient: Carla España

Dr. Carla España is an Assistant Professor of Bilingual Education, Puerto Rican/Latinx, and Latin American Studies in the Department of Puerto Rican and Latinx Studies at Brooklyn College, City University of New York. She is the coauthor of En Comunidad: Lessons for Centering the Voices and Experiences of Bilingual Latinx Students, The Translanguaging Collections: Affirming Bilingual and Multilingual Learners Handbook, forthcoming Brookes Publishing Libros solidarios: Teaching Language and Building Community with Latine Children’s Literature in Spanish K–6, and cofounder of the En Comunidad Collective with Dr. Luz Yadira Herrera. Her forthcoming Routledge/Stenhouse text is titled Narrative Writing with Latinx Teens: Testimonios, Texts, and Teaching.

The award will be presented during the NCTE Annual Convention.

Award Details

Nominations are not accepted for this award.

Purpose:
To honor a junior high/middle level educator who has worked to promote understanding of the developmental needs and characteristics of young adolescents, especially in the English language arts.

Eligibility:
A “middle level educator” is defined as anyone who has worked to improve schools and schooling for the middle level—teacher, principal, curriculum specialist, or supervisor as well as anyone at the university or college level—not necessarily a classroom teacher.

Award Criteria:

• Encouraging a spirit of inquiry and development of critical and creative thinking within the profession;
• Showing evidence of exemplary professional involvement, including participation in activities such as workshops, curriculum development, and association programs and projects;
• Connecting the classroom and the community;
• Fostering the development of literacy education at the middle level;
• Promoting research on the middle level student.

Award Specifics:
The award recipient is presented a plaque at the Middle Level Luncheon during the NCTE Annual Convention.

Established in 1996 by the Junior High/Middle School Assembly, this award honors Richard “Dick” Halle for his dedication to the Assembly and middle level education. The award became a Middle Level Section Award in February 2002 when the Assembly was dissolved.

Learn about the Junior High/Middle School Assembly, Halle Award, and the creation of the Middle Level Section in “Honoring the Past; Looking to the Future.”

Judging:
The Middle Level Section Steering Committee determines the winner based upon candidates meeting the criteria by June 1. Middle Level Section Steering Committee members are not eligible for this award during their tenure.