ROSEMONT, Ill. (July 8, 2015) – The Big Ten Conference announced 54 Rutgers University student-athletes across 17 Scarlet Knight programs were honored on Wednesday with the Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award.
In addition, six Scarlet Knights – baseball’s Max Hermann (Rutherford, N.J.), gymnastics’ Charly Santagado (Celebration, Fla.), men’s lacrosse’s Campell Sode (Dallas, Texas), women’s lacrosse’s Kristin Kocher (Medford, N.J.), swimming and diving’s Morgan Pfaff (Red Lion, Pa.), and volleyball’s Lea Williams (Plainsboro, N.J.) – achieved perfect 4.0 GPAs for the 2014-15 academic year.
Seven-hundred eighty-one students competing in intercollegiate athletics earned the Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award. The list includes students from every institution and 38 different sports who have recorded a minimum grade-point average (GPA) of 3.7 or higher for the previous academic year.
Women’s rowing led all Rutgers programs with seven distinguished scholar honorees, while field hockey and women’s soccer each had six, and women’s lacrosse, swimming and diving and volleyball each had five.
Football placed four student-athletes on the list, women’s track and field had three award winners, baseball, gymnastics, men’s lacrosse and men’s soccer each had two, and women’s cross country, women’s golf, softball, tennis and wrestling each had one honoree.
The 2014-15 class of Distinguished Scholar Award recipients includes 119 students who maintained a perfect 4.0 GPA during the previous academic term. This group of honorees is pursuing diverse fields of study with a list of majors that include accountancy, biological sciences, biomedical engineering, business administration, electrical engineering, journalism, marketing, mathematics and many others.
Big Ten Faculty Representatives established the Distinguished Scholar Award in 2008 to supplement the Academic All-Big Ten program. Similar to the Academic All-Big Ten honor, Distinguished Scholar Award recipients must be letterwinners in at least their second academic year at their institution. However, the Distinguished Scholar Award encompasses only students with a minimum GPA of 3.7 or higher for the previous academic year, excluding summer school. The Academic All-Big Ten threshold is a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher for a student’s academic career.
The full list of Rutgers University’s Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award honorees is below. To view the list of all 781 Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award winners, click here.
Swimming & Diving (5):
Caroline Carlise, Sr. ● Exercise Science & Sports Studies ● Holly Springs, N.C.
Lindsay Gibson-Brokop, Sr. ● Biomedical Engineering ● Edmonton, Alberta
Mehgan Kiely, So. ● Exercise Science & Sports Studies ● Mountain Lakes, N.J.
Greta Leberfinger, Sr. ● Psychology ● Chatham, N.J.
Morgan Pfaff, Jr. ● Criminal Justice ● Red Lion, Pa.
Bold indicates 4.0 GPA
Swimming news courtesy of Rutgers University Athletics.
