Carl Mack

2012 Honoree - Executive director for the National Society of Black Engineers

Carl Mack, a mechanical engineering graduate from Mississippi State University, is so passionate about civil rights that he once shut down a Seattle highway in 2002 while leading a protest involving the shooting of a black man by an off-duty King County sheriff’s deputy. The protest led to Mack’s arrest. Offered a plea bargain, he refused. During his trial, he was found not guilty.

Mack’s actions apparently caught the eye of Seattle’s African-American community. Months after the shooting he was elected president of the city’s branch of the NAACP. During Mack’s tenure, the organization won the Class 1-A Thalheimer Award as the nation’s best branch for its increased growth and funding. Julian Bond, then board chairman of the national NAACP, heralded the Seattle branch for its "extraordinary activity and effectiveness."

Since becoming the executive director for the National Society of Black Engineers in 2005, Mack has led the growth in membership from 12,842 members to 35,776. He also has expanded the organization’s cash reserves from $3.5 million to $9 million, and secured $1 million from a sponsor, NSBE’s largest grant to date. In 2007, he founded NSBE’s Summer Engineering Experience for Kids (SEEK) Academy to expose young African Americans to careers in engineering. SEEK has locations in Washington, D.C.; Columbus, Ohio; San Diego; Oakland, Calif., and New Orleans.

The field of engineering was largely unknown to Mack during his youth.

"As a child growing up, I didn’t know anything about engineering," he said. "As a matter of fact, I thought being an engineer meant I was going to drive a train."

As an author, Mack developed a 365-page daily black history calendar several years ago. "Doing the project gave me such an appreciation for black history," he said. "I then dedicated my life to being able to uplift black people."

Mack serves on the Minority Advisory Board of the Bagley College of Engineering at Mississippi State University, the board of trustees of the Society of Automotive Engineers, and the board of trustees at Clarkson University from which he received an honorary doctorate degree in 2010.