Academic Awards Banquet

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Academic Awards Banquet
Saturday, May 20, 2023, Cox Business Convention Center, Tulsa

The flagship event of the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence is its annual Academic Awards Celebration, which honors 100 of the state’s top public high school seniors and five exceptional educators. The gala event – broadcast statewide on public television – has been called the “Academy Awards” of public education in Oklahoma.

Since 1987, the foundation has selected 100 graduating seniors annually as Academic All-Staters. This prestigious award provides each recipient with a merit-based cash award and medallion. The selection of Academic All-Staters has been described as Oklahoma’s “most rigorous academic competition.”

The celebration also salutes educators who are making exceptional contributions to public education in Oklahoma. Medal for Excellence Awards are presented annually to one educator in each of the following categories:

Elementary Teaching
Secondary Teaching
Elementary/Secondary Administration
Community College/Regional University Teaching
Research University Teaching

The Academic Awards Celebration has featured a variety of distinguished keynote speakers, including the late U.S. President George H.W. Bush, historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, journalist Fareed Zakaria and astronaut Leland Melvin.

Past Event Speakers

2022 Vijay Gupta, violinist, social justice advocate

2021 Erin Gruwell, education activist and author

2019 Leland Melvin, author and former astronaut

2018 Johann Neem, author and professor of history, Western Washington University

2017 H.W. Brands, author and professor of history, University of Texas at Austin

2016 Akhil Amar, author and professor of law and political science, Yale University

2015 David Hackett Fischer, author and professor of history, Brandeis University

2014 Robert D. Putnam, author and professor of public policy, Harvard University

2013 Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times columnist

2012 Fareed Zakaria, CNN Sunday-show host

2011 Michael Bloomberg, business leader and New York City mayor

2010 David McCullough, historian and author

2009 John C. Danforth, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and former U.S. Senator

2008 Doris Kearns Goodwin, biographer, historian and political commentator

2007 Ruth Simmons, president, Brown University

2006 David L. Boren, founder and chairman, Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence

2004 Christine Todd Whitman, former New Jersey Governor

2003 Robert H. Henry, Federal Appellate Judge

2002 Colin Campbell, president, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation

2000 Thomas R. Pickering, U.S. Under Secretary of State

1997 Paul M. Kennedy, professor of history, Yale University

1996 Sol M. Linowitz, author and U.S. diplomat

1993 Barbara Jordan, U.S. Congresswoman and civil rights leader

1992 Dr. Daniel J. Boorstin, historian and Librarian of Congress

1990 George H.W. Bush, president of the United States

1989 H. Ross Perot, businessman, philanthropist, political leader

1988 and 2005 Jack Valenti, president, Motion Picture Association of America

1987 Theodore R. Sizer, chair, Department of Education, Brown University

View our 2023 Academic Awards Celebration Broadcast

The flagship event of the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence is its annual Academic Awards Banquet, which honors 100 of the state’s top public high school seniors and five exceptional educators. The gala event – broadcast statewide on OETA – has been called the “Academy Awards of public education” in Oklahoma. Recipients of the 2023 Academic Awards were honored at the foundation’s Academic Awards Banquet on Saturday, May 20, at the Cox Business Convention Center in Tulsa.

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