A TripleThreat
Outstanding student, athlete and volunteer, UNC-Charlotte track and field star is motivated by an internal drive
By Lelita L. Cannon
Sharonda Latrice Johnson
2005 Arthur Ashe Jr. Female Sports Scholar of the Year School: University of North Carolina-Charlotte
Year: Junior
Major: Chemistry
Cumulative GPA: 3.8
Fall 2004 GPA: 3.7
Sport: Track Field
“Incredible.” That’s the word used to describe track and field standout Sharonda Latrice Johnson.
“Sharonda is the absolute best and brightest. She is the first athletic, as well as academic, All-American Charlotte has ever had,” says Lisa Hibbs, director of the University of North Carolina-Charlotte’s Athletic Academic Advising Center.
Meeting Johnson during the recruitment process, Hibbs has come to know the track and field star over the past two and a half years. Hibbs says Johnson’s motivation comes from an “internal drive.”
T
hat internal drive has led Johnson to rack up a long list of noteworthy accomplishments. She has been on the Chancellor’s List, which requires a 3.8 GPA or higher — all but a single semester, and has been the recipient of the 2003, 2004 and 2005 Conference USA
(C-USA) Commissioner’s Academic Medal, which requires a 
3.75 cumulative GPA or higher. The junior has dominated the triple jump and high jump events in the conference, earning All-America honors in the triple jump at the 2004 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships. Johnson is the first female at UNC-Charlotte to earn an All-America award in a jumping event and only the second female overall at the school to earn All-America honors in track and field. She also captured both the indoor and outdoor C-USA championships in the triple jump as a sophomore in 2004, and became the first Charlotte female to compete at the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships. Johnson also holds the school record in both the indoor and outdoor triple jump, and tied the school record for the indoor high jump. And she has already provisionally qualified for the 2005 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships in the triple and high jump. This is the first time this has ever occurred at Charlotte.
The “ability to do it all incredibly well” is among the track star’s best qualities, says Hibbs who nominated Johnson for the Arthur Ashe Jr. Sports Scholar Award.
