AAC&U Announces the Winner of the 2024 Frederic W. Ness Book Award

Washington, DC—The American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) announced today that Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Climate Crisis, authored by Bryan Alexander and published by Johns Hopkins University Press, is the winner of the 2024 Frederic W. Ness Book Award. The Ness award is given annually to the book that best illuminates the goals and practices of a contemporary liberal education, and it will be formally presented to the author at AAC&U’s Annual Meeting, on January 23, 2025, in Washington, DC. A senior scholar at Georgetown University, Alexander is an internationally known futurist, researcher, writer, speaker, consultant, and teacher.

Drawing on real-world examples and the latest research, Universities on Fire describes the many impacts climate change can have on higher education by surveying contemporary programs and academic climate research from around the world. Alexander establishes models of how academic institutions may respond and offers practical pathways forward for higher education. The book positions colleges and universities in the broader social world, from town-gown relationships to connections between how campuses and civilization as a whole respond to this epochal threat, considering the response to climate change as a new liberal art.

"I am deeply honored and humbled to receive the Frederic W. Ness Book Award,” said Alexander. “I am excited to see growing interest, thought, and action about the climate crisis from this great liberal education organization and its many members.”

The 2024 Ness award winner was selected by a committee of higher education leaders: Kathleen Woodward (committee chair), Lockwood Professor in the Humanities, professor of English, and director of the Simpson Center for the Humanities at the University of Washington; Marco Barker, vice chancellor for diversity and inclusion at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln; Dara Byrne, dean and professor of communications at Macaulay Honors College, the City University of New York; Patricia Marshall, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Fitchburg State University; and Lynn Pasquerella, president of AAC&U.

“Among an exceptionally strong pool of nominees, Universities on Fire stood out because of how effectively and constructively it speaks to the urgency of the moment—its subject matter, interdisciplinarity, creativity, continual grounding in learning, and focus on the future,” said Pasquerella.

Established in 1979 to honor AAC&U’s ninth president, the Frederic W. Ness Book Award recognizes outstanding contributions to the understanding and improvement of liberal education. Recent award winners include The New College Classroom by Cathy N. Davidson and Christina Katopodis; Fugitive Pedagogy: Carter G. Woodson and the Art of Black Teaching by Jarvis R. Givens; The Campus Color Line: College Presidents and the Struggle for Black Freedom by Eddie R. Cole; and Jim Crow Campus: Higher Education and the Struggle for a New Southern Social Order by Joy Ann Williamson-Lott.

About AAC&U

The American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) is a global membership organization dedicated to advancing the democratic purposes of higher education by promoting equity, innovation, and excellence in liberal education. Through our programs and events, publications and research, public advocacy and campus-based projects, AAC&U serves as a catalyst and facilitator for innovations that improve educational quality and equity and that support the success of all students. In addition to accredited public and private, two-year and four-year colleges and universities and state higher education systems and agencies throughout the United States, our membership includes degree-granting higher education institutions in more than twenty-five countries as well as other organizations and individuals. To learn more, visit www.aacu.org.