2025 Program of the Year Award Call 

Innovating and Beyond: EdD Programmatic Proofpoints 

The Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED) is pleased to invite submissions for the 2025 Program of the Year (POY) Award. This award is given annually to one or more outstanding CPED member institutions whose programming demonstrates distinction, excellence, innovation, impact, and alignment with the CPED Framework to promote continuous improvement within varied local contexts. We seek programmatic innovations that are noteworthy for you, that have been impactful for your institution and your students – and that you feel would benefit other CPED member institutions. This award is not intended to identify a so-called “best” program among CPED members but rather to offer evidence of a proofing site that lifts up and features a program’s approaches and components that might stimulate change and innovation among other CPED-influenced programs. The award provides a means for an institution’s program(s) to achieve distinction while simultaneously allowing the consortium to document and track long-term efforts to maintain the integrity and fidelity of CPED-influenced EdD programs.  

The POY 2025 award builds upon the award’s purpose – to cause CPED members to grapple with something new and different and contribute to the original intent of CPED to develop “proofing sites” (Imig et al., 2009).  The POY award illuminates a CPED-influenced program that is exemplary in how future “stewards of practice” are prepared to foster a more just and equitable world, be that in their local communities or across the globe. The winner will be announced at the 2025 CPED Fall Convening.   

The Program of the Year Award is guided by a committee representing nine member institutions. Each year, this committee reviews the relevance of the award and updates the quality indicators that guide its selection process.  The quality indicators are described in a rubric that includes components for the preliminary and final applications.  

Programs of the Year are not necessarily “best” programs. Rather, we seek applicants who have developed innovative initiatives that have been impactful for their population and community.  POY award winners serve as opportunities for learning, as beacons for member institutions, and award recipient journeys become part of CPED’s institutional knowledge base.  There are a variety of ways in which award recipients contribute to this knowledge base: presentations, articles, and supporting future year POY awards through participation on the POY Committee.  Details on the submission and evaluation process are below. 

Eligible applicants need to have graduated students from their CPED influenced program component described in the application - in which the described transformation took place.  Applications will be examined for concrete evidence that the innovation has impacted the institution and its communities. 

The application process has two phases. Phase one consists of a preliminary application that explains how the program innovation meets institutional and CPED alignment as a condition for an invitation to submit a full application.  Those who meet this threshold will be invited to continue to phase two and submit a full application focused only on the transformation you wish to highlight and the impact that transformation has had on equity and social justice.  A full timeline for POY 2025 is as follows: 

Interested but want to know more?  Join us for one of two information sessions on the application process: 

November 7 @12 PM EST:  

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82900072431?pwd=jrTCZbCNabqKne6aFZjWEzLpX3RDpz.1

Meeting ID: 829 0007 2431 

Passcode: 965903

And 

November 19 @ 3 PM EST:  

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83074476692?pwd=riiEdZaEAjJL5SRXbno7dLNClV9FdN.1

Meeting ID: 830 7447 6692

Passcode: 583472 

Closing date for the completed Preliminary Application is February 3, 2025, 11:59 PST. 

All submissions should be made online at this link. 

We look forward to your application! 

Imig, D., Perry, J.A., & Syed, S. (2009). Creating rubrics for the assessment of the Ed.D.: Narrative report 

  to the Spencer Foundation. College Park, MD: Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate.