AFCEA and U.S. Naval Institute Awards
The U.S. Naval Institute and AFCEA International are honored to recognize individuals each year who are selected based on their sustained superior performance in a C4I/IT-related job. A board of judges reviews nominations from the departments of the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, including active duty and civilians, and makes the selections.
The Copernicus Award recognizes individual contributions to naval warfare in C4I/IT, Information Systems, Cyber Operations, and Information Warfare.
The awardee will be selected from nominations received from U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, and U.S. Coast Guard (including Joint/NATO) commands, afloat and ashore. Each nomination command is limited to two nominees. No contractor or team (more than one person) nominations will be accepted. Nominations must be unclassified.
This award is presented at the WEST conference in San Diego, California.
Award Overview
The Copernicus award was established in 1997 as a result of a discussion among Lt. Gen. C. Norman Wood, USAF (Ret.), then-president and CEO of AFCEA International, Capt. James A. Barber, USN (Ret.), then-publisher and CEO of the U.S. Naval Institute, and the late Vice Adm. Art Cebrowski, USN, who was the Navy N6 at that time. The name for the award came from the Copernicus Architecture used as the blueprint for the future C4I structure of the Navy.
While the award was established in 1997, its history with AFCEA International goes much further back. The Copernicus Architecture (shifting the center of the universe) was drafted in December 1990, under the direction of the Navy’s Vice Adm. Jerry O. Tuttle. It was explained in the August 1991 SIGNAL and in the AFCEA International Press book Naval Command and Control, Policy, Programs, People and Issues (December 1991). This revolution in post-Cold War Navy C3 thinking, but without the name Copernicus, first appeared in the August 1988 Signal, in Strategic C3 Systems for the 21st Century, by Adm. Tuttle. A review of that architecture contains issues that resonate and are unsolved today.
It predicted “prolonged regional conflicts in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf ... a scramble for intelligence and resultant inundation of information.” It called for a modular approach to software with data in a common binary format and open system architectures. It recommended shifting investment away from "stove-pipe, vertical, end-to-end systems, in favor of horizontal building block programs and with off-the-shelf commercial equipment. It said the requirement for joint interoperability is greatly magnified in C4I systems, especially in the contingency and low-intensity conflict environments ... where a joint task force commander is likely to be the tactical on-scene commander."
Vice Adm. Cebrowski (a disciple of Tuttle’s) was honored in 2003 with a special award of merit for initiating these awards. His last major address was at West 2005 after leaving as the first director of the Office of Force Transformation. The U.S. Naval Institute and AFCEA International are honored to recognize individuals who continue to demonstrate in operations that Copernicus remains relevant today.
Nominations for the FY24 Copernicus Award are closed
Please email edfoundation@afcea.org with any questions.
FY24 Copernicus Award Winners NAVADMIN Announcement