The Michael A. Olivas Award for Outstanding Leadership in Diversity and Mentoring in the Legal Academy will be awarded to the AALS faculty member who most vividly exemplifies Professor Olivas’s devotion to mentoring and diversity. The recipient will be a faculty member with an outstanding record of mentoring junior and aspiring faculty from underrepresented communities and otherwise promoting diversity, inclusion, and equity in the legal academy.

The Legacy in Leadership Award is given to a person who is a senior member of our discipline and has made outstanding contributions to the academic support profession throughout their career, including building and evolving the discipline of academic support. The Trailblazer Award is given to a person who is inspiring change in the academic support profession today and catapulting us forward to a stronger tomorrow.

The Four Directions Section Awards honor individuals who have made contributions to the field of Indian Nations and Indigenous Peoples: Four awards are available: Early Career (7 years or less) Scholarship Award, Clinic Impact Award, Early Career (7 years or less) Teaching and/or Public Service Award, and Mentoring in the Legal Academy Award.

Awarded to a scholar who is within their first ten years of teaching at an AALS member school for an article on the subject of law and religion published within twelve months of the submission deadline, which is August 15 of each year. The article must be nominated by a faculty member at an AALS member school.

This award recognizes an individual in the section who has made a significant and/or long-term contribution to (a) the use of technology to enhance teaching; and/or (b) preparing students to use technology effectively in their learning and future practice; and/or (c) equipping students to create technology to improve our legal system (including improving access to legal information and services).

The Deborah L. Rhode Award honors contributions, service, and leadership of current or new trailblazers in legal education and the legal profession. The award is presented to a legal academic or lawyer who exemplifies the groundbreaking work, imagination, and inspired action of Deborah Rhode during her career.

The American Constitution Society’s Ruth Bader Ginsburg Award recognizes an outstanding scholar in the early stages of their academic career who has demonstrated those qualities exemplified by Justice Ginsburg: scholarly excellence, the ability to imagine how society might be more just and more equal, and the determination to use the law and one’s scholarship to creatively and strategically make the imagined real.

The American Society of International Law bestows three book awards, known as ASIL Certificates of Merit, for (1) "preeminent contribution to creative scholarship;" (2) "a specialized area of international law;" and (3) "high technical craftsmanship and utility to practicing lawyers and scholars."
A fourth annual book award, known as the Robert E. Dalton Book Award for Outstanding Contribution in the Field of Foreign Relations Law.

The Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities Board on Human Sciences Outstanding Engagement Award recognizes an individual who is a "campus based" or a "state level faculty member" for exceptional creativity and scholarship in the development, application, and evaluation of outreach, extension, and public service programs.

These awards aim at promoting antitrust scholarship. Awards include best articles, best soft laws and studies, and best student papers.

This award recognizes emerging talents in the library world—both great leaders and behind-the-scenes contributors who are providing inspiration and model programs for others.

The Strauss Center for International Security and Law at the University of Texas at Austin and Ohio Northern University’s Pettit College of Law (ONU), in consultation with the American Association of Law Schools (AALS) Section on National Security Law, have established the Mike Lewis Prize for National Security Law Scholarship. Only articles written by full-time faculty members of AALS-member schools are eligible for nomination. Diversity in nominees and perspectives is strongly encouraged, and we especially hope to see nominations of the work of new and emerging scholars.

The Liberty Legacy Foundation Award is given annually by the Organization of American Historians to the author of the best book by a historian on the civil rights struggle from the beginnings of the nation to the present.

This award recognizes one senior faculty member (post-tenure or middle-to-late career if not in a tenure line) each year. Honorees (who must be affiliated with a Campus Compact member institution) are recognized for exemplary engaged scholarship, including leadership in advancing students’ civic learning, conducting community-based research, fostering reciprocal community partnerships, building institutional commitments to service-learning and civic engagement, and other means of enhancing higher education’s contributions to the public good.

The Chancellor’s Entrepreneurial Achievement Awards recognize UW innovators and alumni who further the Wisconsin Idea through outstanding accomplishments in entrepreneurship. Honorees have achieved great entrepreneurial success that contributes to economic growth and social good, offers models for the UW community, and inspires the campus culture of entrepreneurship.

UW-Madison employees who perform HR-related functions for at least 50% of their job are eligible to be nominated for an award. There are three awards: Rising Star Award, Embracing Innovation Award, and Outstanding Leadership Award.

Slesinger Awards recognize mentoring of women, trans, or non-binary faculty on the tenure track. Nominations from a group of writers or a single writer are welcome; however, a collective nomination of a mentor who has supported more than one protégé is looked on favorably. The most successful nominations clearly articulate how a mentor’s efforts have had a positive impact in the life and career of the protégé(s) and/or have had a lasting impact on the institution.

The Elizabeth S. Pringle Award recognizes employees for their outstanding achievements. Any employee designated as University Staff, who has completed their final probation, is eligible to be nominated. Winner receives a $1000 award.

The Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professorships recognize professors whose distinguished scholarship has advanced the confines of knowledge, and whose excellence has also included teaching or service. Faculty members receiving this award carry the title of Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor for the duration of their careers at UW-Madison.

The Vilas Faculty Early Investigator Award recognizes research and teaching excellence in faculty who are relatively early in their careers. The Vilas Faculty Mid-Career Investigator Awards to recognize research and teaching excellence in mid-career faculty members. These awards provide between $25,000 and $100,000 in flexible funding over two years.

Vilas Researcher Awards provide $12,500 to be paid to the recipient over two years in recognition of new and ongoing research of the highest quality and significance. UW-Madison academic staff with professorial titles who have permanent PI status or have been granted limited PI status are eligible for this award. This award can only be awarded once to any staff member.