Dian Fossey Award

Daria accepting the award

The Dian Fossey Award is an award at Lawndale High. It gets its first and only mention in Is It College Yet?. The award is a gorilla posed like Rodin's The Thinker.

Dian Fossey is a primatologist famous for her contributions to the study of gorillas in situ, albeit through tactics that eventually led to her torturing and kidnapping fellow human beings in the name of conservation. The "Dian Fossey Award for Academic Achievement in the Face of Near-Total Misanthropy" is awarded to Daria, recognizing her significant achievements despite disregard for her fellow teachers and classmates, echoing Fossey's significant scientific contributions in spite of her disdain (to put it lightly) for the people she encountered during her studies.

Daria received the Dian Fossey Award at her graduation's commencement ceremonies, to the applause of her fellow students and the assorted relatives and guests. She was rather startled to get it. Upon presenting the award, Ms. Li made the following remarks:

"And now, people, and now... and now, awards time! We'll do the sports and other good prizes after I get these academic jobbies is out of the way. Now, as you know, at Lawndale High we prefer to reward students for both their scholarship and contribution to student life. But, occasionally, a student does so well in one area that we are forced to recognize him or her despite crippling deficiencies in the other. And so, I give you the winner of this year's Lawndale High School Diane Fossey Award for dazzling academic achievement in the face of near-total misanthropy... Ms. Daria Morgendorffer!"