About the Award

The University of Washington Tacoma Distinguished Research Award was initiated in 2004. Given annually, the purpose of this award is to recognize a faculty member who has achieved a record of notable scholarship or creative activity, who has generated new knowledge or creativity that impacts their intellectual discipline, and who has contributed to the intellectual climate of the UW Tacoma campus and its communities. All University of Washington Tacoma faculty members are eligible.

2026 Recipient

Anaid Yerena, Ph.D. 
Associate Professor, School of Urban Studies 

Dr. Anaid Yerena has a sustained record of notable, justice-centered scholarship in housing policy, urban planning, and spatial justice.  Dr. Yerena’s work on antiracism and decolonial housing has shaped conversations in Urban Studies and has been recognized through publications in leading journals and book chapters, including an invited chapter in a field-defining textbook. She is the co-PI on an NSF-funded International Research Experience for Students program, a half-million-dollar grant that advances systems-oriented housing research while creating transformative international learning opportunities for students.  Dr. Yerena’s tri-campus leadership role in developing UW’s Community-Engagement Principles further demonstrates her contribution to shaping institutional norms around community-engaged scholarship. 

2025-2026 Committee

  • Martine De Cock, Professor and Committee Chair, School of Engineering &Technology
  • Asia Bishop, Assistant Professor, School of Social Work & Criminal Justice
  • Alison Gardell, Assistant Professor, School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
  • Nasir Haghighi, Assistant Professor, Milgard School of Business
  • Sae saem Yoon, Assistant Professor, School of Education 

Past recipients

  • 2025 - Martine De Cock, Professor, School of Engineering & Technology 
  • 2024 - Angela Kitali, Assistant Professor, School of Engineering & Technology
  • 2023 - Xingyue (Luna) Zhang, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Milgard School of Business
  • 2022 - Erin Casey, Professor, School of Social Work & Criminal Justice
  • 2021 - Haluk Demirkan, Professor, Milgard School of Business
  • 2020 - Edward Kolodziej, Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering (Seattle) and the School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences (Tacoma)
  • 2019 - Ka Yee Yeung, Associate Professor, School of Engineering & Technology
  • 2018 – Eric Madfis, Associate Professor, Social Work & Criminal Justice
  • 2017 - Marian Harris, Professor, Social Work & Criminal Justice
  • 2016 - Carolyn West, Associate Professor, School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Video: Writing the Books You Want to Read
  • 2015 - Peter Horak, Professor, School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Video: The World of Mathematics
  • 2014 - Yonn Dierwechter, Associate Professor, Urban Studies
    • Presentation: Rain without thunder: City-regions and the global search for a sustainable order
  • 2013 - Mike Allen, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: I've Got Friends in Low Places: The Intellectual Life of an Anti-Intellectual
  • 2012 - Divya McMillin, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: Producing Place: Media and Soft Power
  • 2011 - Rich Furman, Social Work
    • The professor and the blank page: Writing, rituals and our relationship to the written word
  • 2010 - Michael Honey, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: All Labor Has Dignity
  • 2009 - Claudia Gorbman, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: Listening to Movies
  • 2008 - Joe Sharkey, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: Don't Think; Look! Language Does Things it Can't Do
  • 2007 - Anthony D'Costa, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
    • Presentation: WYSIWYG/D: Doing Research at UWT
  • 2006 - Marcy Stein, Education
  • 2005 - John Banks, Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
  • 2004 - Charles Emlet, Social Work
    • Presentation: Aging and HIV/AIDS: Lessons Learned... Moving Forward