Aaron Swartz Award

What is the Aaron Swartz Award?

Writing Commons hosts The Aaron Swartz Award to celebrate both Swartz’s leadership and the contributions of our authors. Award winners are chosen annually by our team of content and review editors. To choose a finalist, our editors review and rank all of the articles published during the preceding year.

Related Topics: Contribute; Intellectual Openness

Award Winners

2022

• Cameron Hunt McNabb
  • Ableist Language – Disability Metaphors – Disability Studies

2021

• Christine Photinos and Ramie Tateishi
  • Rhetorical Analysis of Film — Elements of Film

2020

• Dan Melzer, D.J. Quinn, Lisa Sperber, and Sarah Faye
  • So Your Instructor is Using Contract Grading
  • Contract Grading Rubric: Labor-Emphasis

2015

• Angela Eward-Mangione
  • Literary Criticism: An Introduction

2014

• Maggie Melo
  • Creating ‘Viral’ Impressions: Composing Infographics for the Classroom and Workspace

2013

• Andrea Scott
  • Formulating a Thesis

Who Was Aaron Swartz?

Aaron Swartz was a leader and activist for the open web and civic engagement. Swartz passionately believed that knowledge should be freely shared as opposed to locked behind paywalls. By launching the Progressive Change Campaign, Swartz helped raise awareness about meaningful online activism.

Learn More about Aaron Swartz

• Aaron Swartz Day
• Aaron Swartz’s Brilliant Life and Tragic Death – Rolling Stone
• r/AaronSwartz
• The Internet’s Own Boy (a documentary)