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Home > Featured Stories > Outside the Classroom > February 2009 > Called to ServeCalled to Serve
NC State is not just a place to fill one's head with knowledge and hide away from the rest of the world... it is a university that is dedicated to using innovations in understanding to benefit others.
John Coggin ('09)
John Coggin (right) accepts the inaugural President William Jefferson Clinton Hunger Leadership Award.
By Dave Pond, Web Communication
Growing up as a middle-schooler in Sanford, N.C. John Coggin ('09) began to volunteer at the local soup kitchen as a way to love those less fortunate in the community around him.
But it's Coggin's work with NC State's Presbyterian Campus Ministry and international hunger relief organization Stop Hunger Now that has given him a more global perspective in the fight against hunger – one that was recognized last week when the NC State senior was named the nation's first recipient of the President William Jefferson Clinton Hunger Leadership Award.
"Meeting President Clinton was a wonderfully exciting experience," said Coggin, a Park Scholar and communications major who joined Clinton onstage following the former president's Millennium Seminar Series lecture Jan. 26. "I was particularly impressed with the expanse of his knowledge as it relates to hunger-related issues, and I was honored to meet and shake the hand of the man who is doing so much to fight hunger and its effects in our world."
Ending world hunger is truly a vision shared by our nation's 42nd president and Coggin himself, according to Mike Giancola, director of NC State's Center for Student Leadership, Ethics & Public Service (CSLEPS).
"John has a demonstrated record of working on hunger-related issues and causes, and has displayed incredible leadership in the fight against hunger," Giancola said. "Not only has he held positions of leadership but equally as important, he has used the power of influence to make a difference.
"He has a bright future ahead of him."
Coggin, a 4.0 student at NC State, was chosen from what Giancola deemed an "outstanding" group of candidates for the inaugural award, sponsored jointly by NC State and Stop Hunger Now, and created specifically to honor Clinton for his commitment to humanitarian causes – especially the eradication of worldwide hunger.
Beginning next year, students from colleges and universities across the country will be eligible for award nomination, and a nationwide team of hunger advocates will help select the annual winner. NC State will continue to manage the award process.
"Each year, we hope to use the President William Jefferson Clinton Hunger Leadership Award to recognize students doing incredible and unselfish work in this area," Giancola said. "The fact that NC State will administer the award on an annual basis truly helps further our mission to provide global leadership in the fight against hunger."
The Clinton award was designed by College of Design professor Haig Khachatoorian, who has created a number of other prominent university-level awards at NC State, and presented to Coggin by fellow senior Vansana Nolintha, whom the former president also lauded for his humanitarian service during his undergraduate years at NC State.
"NC State has been both a wonderful setting and a dynamic player in fostering the love of service in me, in my classmates and in my friends," Coggin said. "NC State is not just a place to fill one's head with knowledge and hide away from the rest of the world – it is a university that is dedicated to using innovations in understanding to benefit others."
Although Coggin is uncertain of the path that he will take after graduating from NC State in May, he is certain that he will continue to work on hunger issues and the societal problems they cause.
He has applied for the Emerson National Hunger Fellowship, a year-long program that would allow Coggin to work for an urban- or rurally-based, hunger-fighting organization, then travel to Washington D.C. to focus on policy work for the final six months.
"I cannot say that my life's work will involve a direct connection to issues of hunger – it may, or it may not," he said. "However, whether I am working in the government or non-profit sector addressing issues of conflict resolution, social justice, or poverty, the immediate problem of hunger will always be related to my area of focus, and it is one that I will always keep in the forefront of my mind."
