When I was a student, I fell in love with the discipline of engineering and the power it gave me to understand problems and build solutions that improve people’s lives. Throughout my career in academia and business, IEEE has been my professional home, a source of cherished friendships and collaborations, and a vehicle that has enabled me and other volunteers to enact positive change in the profession.

As a proud recipient of several IEEE awards, including the 2021 IEEE Leon K. Kirchmayer Graduate Teaching Award, and head of the IEEE ad hoc committee on diversity, inclusion, and ethics, I am keenly aware of the important role that awards programs play in the engineering field. They elevate and celebrate the leaders who have enabled unprecedented advancement of technology and expanded its practical impact. They also provide young people with role models.

That is why I am proud to share the open call for nominations for two prestigious Marconi Society awards with my IEEE colleagues. I urge you to nominate worthy candidates. I especially encourage you to consider nominating people who represent the geographic, ethnic, and gender diversity that reflects the richness of the populations that we, as engineers, serve.

The Marconi Society envisions a world in which everyone can benefit from the opportunities of connectivity. Our awards honor both distinguished luminaries and rising stars in the field of information and communications technology (ICT) and welcome them into a diverse community dedicated to digital inclusion through advanced technology.

• The Marconi Prize celebrates established scientists who have made fundamental contributions to our connected world. I was honored to become a 2020 Marconi Fellow and to join the ranks of legendary innovators and IEEE honorees including IEEE Medal of Honor recipients Jacob Ziv, Bradford Parkinson, David Forney, Irwin Jacobs, Andrew Viterbi, and others. Nominations for the Marconi Prize are open through 1 June 2021.
• The Paul Baran Young Scholar Award recognizes innovators who are creating the next frontiers in ICT. Hailing from every continent except Antarctica, our scholars are a diverse group of leaders changing the world in academic, business, and social sectors. Many—including Yasaman Ghasempour, Qurrat-Ul-Ain Nadeem, Ken Pesyna, and Piotr Roztocki—are IEEE and IEEE-HKN members. Nominations for the Young Scholar Award are open through 15 May 2021.

Thank you for considering your colleagues and students for the prestigious Marconi honors. We look forward to your nominations. Please contact us with any questions: prizes@marconisociety.org.

IEEE Fellow Andrea Goldsmith is the dean of engineering and applied science at Princeton, where she is a professor of electrical and computer engineering.

A version of this blog appeared on IEEE Spectrum.