Initiated in 1989, the awards program recognizes outstanding teaching by teaching assistants in the schools of Humanities and Sciences, Earth Sciences and Engineering.

Ewart Thomas, a professor of psychology, established the program during his years as dean of the School of Humanities and Sciences to acknowledge the important role that teaching assistants play at Stanford.

Each year, half of the departments in the School of Humanities and Sciences are invited to choose usually one to three (depending on the size of the department or program) of their graduate-student teachers to be honored by the designation Centennial Teaching Assistant. In Engineering and Earth Sciences, all departments are eligible to nominate TAs each year, and from two to seven are chosen as winners.

View all recipients of the Centennial TA Award.