By Chris Shott and Danielle Rexrode
THE ERICKSON TRIBUNE

Jerome E. Levy, who lives at Brooksby Village, was announced as a winner of the 2007 Bernard M. Gordon Prize for educational innovation earlier this year by the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) in Washington, D.C.

According to published reports, Levy will receive a gold medallion and a handlettered certificate, and share a $500,000 cash award with fellow recipients Dr. Arthur W. Winston, Harold S. Goldberg, and The Gordon Institute of Tufts University of Medford, Mass. They will be honored Sept. 30 in Washington at the NAE’s annual meeting.

Levy and his fellow recipients were recognized for developing a “multidisciplinary graduate program for those who have the desire to be engineering leaders.”

According to Levy, the emphasis of the work he and the other recipients completed was on long-term, not short-term benefits.

‘Engineers of tomorrow’
“This award is given for developing potential engineering leaders,” Levy says. “We stressed transitional research methods. We are looking for engineers of tomorrow who are willing to take risks in business and industry, not just meet quarterly earnings goals.”

According to the NAE website, “The intent of the Gordon prize is to recognize new ideas and experiments in education to develop engineering leaders. A focus on curricular design, teaching methods, and technology- enabled learning are the proponents for strengthening students’ capabilities.”

The Gordon prize is the latest in a long string of professional successes during the past seven decades for Levy, who began as a teacher at the Preparatory School of the College of the City of New York. Later he worked as an electronics technician in the U.S. Navy and as a civilian training expert and fire-control analyst with the Naval Department’s Bureau of Ordnance.