Castel Sweet is a sociologist who explores the intricacies of community, culture, and race. Through her work as a community engagement professional, she encourages the unknown to be explored, endeavors to make the unfamiliar familiar, and seeks to cultivate relationships that are transformational instead of transactional. Castel’s formal training in sociology enables her to comprehensively develop, support, and advocate for ethical and appropriate community-campus collaborations and community engagement at the collegiate level.
In addition to her work as a community engagement professional, Castel is a qualitative scholar whose research currently explores the influence of place and space in the identity development of artists, and how artists use those identities to guide their interactions with their local community. She also investigates the significance of artists’ interactions and relationships in the cultivation of social and cultural capital. Castel uses in-depth interviews with artists to examine the ways in which they use their art to pursue social change and community engagement. She has authored and co-authored journal publications and encyclopedia entries.
Castel attended Hampton University for her undergraduate studies, receiving a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice/Criminology in 2012. In 2014, she earned a Master’s of Arts in Sociology from Louisiana State University and continued on to complete her doctorate degree in Sociology at LSU in 2017.
Awards & Honors
2020 Dayton Business Journal Forty Under 40
2020 Ambition List Honoree
2020 Women of UD
Midwest Campus Compact Engaged Scholar
Current Board and Community Service
Leadership Lafayette – 2022 Class
Lafayette Community Remembrance Project – Steering Team
Past Board and Community Service
YWCA Dayton, Board Member, 2020-2021
Dayton Young Black Professionals, Advisory Board, 2019-2021
Re-Imagining America: Dayton, OH, Design Team, 2018-2021