N.C. Campus Compact recognizes University administrator as a leader in civic engagement

Sean Langley is the 2019 recipient of the Civic Engagement Professional of the Year Award from North Carolina Campus Compact.

Langley ’05 M.A., assistant director for Leadership & Community Engagement since 2009, is responsible for articulating and carrying out the vision for community engagement in Student Affairs. By strengthening the partnership between the Divisions of Student Affairs and Academic Affairs, he has helped increase the number of faculty, staff, classes and learning communities that are formally involved in service learning. Most recently, he served on the Community Engagement Task Force formed to develop strategies to envision UNC Charlotte as a national model for community engagement for an urban research university. He will work to integrate his efforts with those of the Office of Engaged Scholarship that emerged as a result of the visioning process.

During his University tenure, Langley has helped launch and develop many of the signature community engagement programs. He co-directs the Bonner Leaders Program, an intensive four-year community engagement initiative for undergraduate students, which he helped bring to UNC Charlotte in 2016. He also coordinates alternative Spring Break trips for students interested in affordable housing and has led a trip to El Salvador to build Habitat homes. Langley also serves as the advisor for the UNC Charlotte Habitat for Humanity Chapter.

Co-founder of the Jamil Niner Student Pantry, which annually provides food to 3,200 students struggling with food insecurity, Langley is considered the “vision and force” behind the Food Recovery Program in which students reclaim leftover, unused food from campus dining halls and repackage it for distribution at the pantry; Langley has developed a unique model of “students serving students” in which the campus meets the needs of its own in-need and at-risk students. This academic year he partnered with several campus entities to become one of only two campuses in North Carolina to participate in Swipe Out Hunger, a national program that re-allocates meal swipes to students in need.

Langley extends his community outreach beyond UNC Charlotte by volunteering at Freedom School, a summer literacy program for underserved children, serving on the board for the Charlotte Mecklenburg Food Policy Council and as a member of 100 Black Men of America. Currently, he is involved in Leadership Charlotte, an invitation-only civic organization with a mission to develop and enhance volunteer community leadership by providing a diverse group of emerging and existing leaders with the opportunity to increase their community knowledge, civic network and service to the community. A graduate of Johnson C. Smith University, Langley completed a Master of Arts in Sociology from UNC Charlotte in 2005.

The Civic Engagement Professional of the Year Award recognizes a higher education administrator in the state who works to realize a campus-wide vision of service, supports the engagement of faculty and students, and forms innovative campus-community partnerships.

This is the second consecutive year that a UNC Charlotte adminstrator has been recognized by North Carolina Campus Compact; Tamara Johnson received the 2018 Emerging Leader Award.

North Carolina Campus Compact is a collaborative network of 39 colleges and universities committed to educating students for civic and social responsibility, partnering with communities for positive change and strengthening democracy. The network was founded in 2002 and is hosted by Elon University. North Carolina Campus Compact is an affiliate of the national Campus Compact organization, which claims 1,000 member schools representing nearly 2 million college students.