The UT Commission for Women is accepting nominations for the Women of Achievement Award to be presented at the Provost’s Honors Banquet.

The award is to recognize women who have improved the status of women on campus through their accomplishments in a traditional or non-traditional role.

“(The Award) recognizes women who are not very good at singing their own praises,” Nancy Goslee, past chair for the Commission for Women and a member of the Women of Achievement Committee, said.

“I think it’s important to recognize that women not only have done good jobs in their sort of regular work assignments or student assignments on campus, but that many people have made particular efforts for improving the status of women on campus, and so we want to bear witness to that,” Goslee said.

The award is given in three categories: Staff (exempt and non-exempt), faculty and students (graduate and undergraduate). Goslee said that, depending on the number of nominations, they sometimes give an award for a graduate and an undergraduate. It is one of the few awards presented at the Provost’s Honors Banquet that is not solely for faculty.

The Women of Achievement Award was established and is decided by the UT Commission for Women, an advocacy group devoted to the advancement of women on campus.

Goslee said that the award was started in the ’90s as a “sort of separatist movement to recognize what women have done for other women as well as the campus,” because there were many awards given to men but not very many were given to women.

Goslee does not believe that is as true today, though.

The committee is still accepting nominations for the award until the deadline on Feb. 14. The commission would like more nominations, especially staff and student nominations, and self-nominations are accepted. Nomination forms are available online at http://www.cfw.utk.edu.