The Julie Ellison Vision Award, honoring the visionary work of IA’s founding faculty director and Professor Emerita at University of Michigan, recognizes the leading-edge visions for justice, equity, and relentless support of the next generation of public scholars by current and former fellows in IA’s Publicly Active Graduate Education (PAGE) program. Under Julie’s leadership, the PAGE Fellows program launched in 2003 and expanded through the organized efforts of community-engaged graduate student fellows in the arts and humanities from IA member institutions.

This award honors a former PAGE fellow who demonstrates an ongoing commitment to publicly engaged graduate education in their current institution or organization, in a manner that reflects the values and vision of Dr. Julie Ellison.

About Julie Ellison

Professor Emerita at University of Michigan, Julie held joint appointments in the Departments of American Culture and English Language and Literature. Her scholarship addresses literary and cultural history focusing on gender and genre in 18th- and 19th-century U.S. and Britain, and she has published extensively on civic engagement in higher education and cultural organizations, and the public humanities.

In 1999, Julie became the founding faculty director of Imagining America, setting the foundation for twenty-five years of work focusing the combined energies of higher education and the public arts and humanities on building the commons. With Timothy K. Eatman, she co-authored Scholarship in Public: Knowledge Creation and Tenure Policy in the Engaged University (2008)—a crucial text advocating for campus change to recognize public scholarship among faculty.