Cooper Awards

Academic Ambassador Award

The Benjamin Cooper Academic Ambassador Award is an annual award presented by PACE to recognize an individual or organization whose above-and-beyond contributions to the quizbowl community embody, by example, the ideals of academic competition. The original Cooper Award was named in honor of Benjamin Cooper, a student at Georgetown Day School who had been named captain of his team prior to his untimely death on August 12, 1997. The Cooper Academic Ambassador Award has been awarded at every NSC since PACE’s founding.

PACE is proud to present the 2022 Benjamin Cooper Academic Ambassador Award to Kristin Strey, founder of the Scholastic Community Outreach Program (SCOP), for her tireless commitment to outreach and resource creation to make the game of quizbowl more accessible for new coaches, players, writers, and everyone in between.

Young Ambassador Award

In 2004, PACE added the Benjamin Cooper Young Ambassador Award, which specifically recognizes the contributions of under the age of 25. Many winners of the “Young Cooper” award were high school or college students at the time when they were recognized.

PACE is proud to present the 2022 Benjamin Cooper Young Ambassador Award to Kevin Kodama of the University of Washington for his exemplary leadership and extensive outreach work to introduce more schools in the Washington circuit to the world of pyramidal quizbowl through sustained efforts to build and maintain relationship with teams and coaches new to quizbowl.