The Director of the Coccia Institute is delighted to announce the 2017 Coccia-Inserra Award for Excellence and Innovation in the Teaching of Italian (K-12). Recognizing the importance of acknowledging and motivating excellence in the teaching of Italian, the Coccia family and Lawrence Inserra, Jr., have established this significant award.

Our donors will be awarding a very generous prize of $5000 as the monetary component of the Coccia-Inserra Award for Excellence and Innovation in the Teaching of Italian (K-12) for academic year 2017. These funds are to be allocated as follows:

a) $2500 is to be used exclusively to advance the Italian language and culture curriculum and programming within the recipient’s classroom;

b) $2500 is to be dedicated to the professional development of the winning teacher (for direct payment of academic fees to an institution of professional development in Italian language and culture at home or abroad).