Collaboratory co-founder Kristin Medlin received the Community Engagement Excellence Award for leadership in higher education community engagement, engagement assessment, and responsible AI innovation.
Collaboratory, a higher education community engagement and partnership tracking platform, is proud to share that Kristin Medlin, Collaboratory co-founder and Director of Research and Development, has received the Community Engagement Excellence Award from the Institute for Community and Economic Engagement at UNC Greensboro.
This award recognizes Kristin’s longstanding contributions to community engagement at UNC Greensboro and across higher education. It also reflects her work advancing thoughtful approaches to engagement assessment, institutional data strategy, and the responsible use of artificial intelligence in higher education settings.
Kristin's connection to this work is deeply rooted at UNCG. As an alumna, scholar, practitioner, and technology leader, she has spent years helping institutions better understand and support community-engaged work. More recently, that work has included helping shape conversations around AI in higher education — not simply how AI can automate processes, but how institutions can use AI responsibly to support learning, transparency, reciprocity, and strategic decision-making.
Advancing Responsible AI in Higher Education Community Engagement
At Collaboratory, AI development has never been approached as a standalone technology initiative. Instead, Kristin has helped lead a framework grounded in the realities and values of higher education community engagement itself.
That distinction matters.
While many technology platforms apply generalized AI models to higher education workflows, Collaboratory’s approach is informed by decades of experience in institutional engagement practice, assessment, Carnegie-aligned frameworks, and university-community partnership development. The goal is not simply efficiency, but helping institutions bring greater consistency, clarity, and insight to how community engagement activities and partnerships are understood across campus.
Under Kristin’s leadership, Collaboratory has focused on developing AI capabilities that support institutional stewardship of engagement data while preserving the context, nuance, and relationship-centered nature of community engagement work.
This approach reflects Collaboratory’s belief that technology should strengthen institutional understanding and decision-making without losing sight of the people, partnerships, and public purpose behind the data.
A Lasting Contribution to the Field
Kristin has played a central role in Collaboratory’s evolution from an initiative rooted at UNCG into a national platform supporting colleges and universities across the country.
Unlike many engagement tracking or reporting systems developed outside the field, Collaboratory was built directly from the operational, assessment, and strategic realities of higher education community engagement. The platform helps institutions track partnerships, document engagement activity, support Carnegie Classification and accreditation efforts, assess impact, identify patterns of engagement, and align engagement strategy with institutional priorities.
Today, institutions use Collaboratory to bring greater visibility, coordination, and actionable insight to community-engaged work across campus.
Kristin’s work has also contributed to broader national conversations around engagement assessment, institutional infrastructure, classification, and capacity-building in higher education, helping institutions move beyond anecdotal reporting toward more connected, evidence-informed engagement strategy.
Looking Ahead
This recognition reflects not only Kristin’s individual leadership, but also the importance of building technology in partnership with the field it serves.
As colleges and universities navigate rapid change in institutional data strategy and artificial intelligence, Collaboratory remains committed to developing practical, transparent, and ethically grounded tools for higher education community engagement.
We are honored to see Kristin’s contributions recognized in this way and excited for the continued impact of her work on institutions, partnerships, and communities nationwide.
Congratulations, Kristin, on this well-deserved honor.
