Wingate’s Candace Donald Wins NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship

July 8, 2003

Indianapolis, Ind.----Wingate University softball infielder Candace Donald (Iva, S.C.) has been awarded an NCAA postgraduate scholarship valued at $6,900, NCAA officials announced last week. Donald is only the third student-athlete in Wingate history to win an NCAA postgraduate scholarship. Basketball standouts Ann Hancock (1992) and Nessy Brewer Baker (1995) are Wingate's previous winners.

An All-South Atlantic Conference performer for two seasons, Donald owns a 3.943 GPA in her athletic training major. A four-year starter, she hit .295 this season as the Bulldogs compiled a 34-15 record (11-3 in the SAC). Winners of the 2003 Food Lion South Atlantic Conference tournament, Wingate University advanced to the NCAA Division II play-offs for the first time in school history.

A summa cum laude graduate at Wingate's May 10 commencement exercises, Donald was chairperson of the University's Student-Athlete Advisory Council (SAAC), a position she held for two-plus years. In addition, she represented the institution on the South Atlantic Conference's SAAC.

Donald won two awards at Wingate's 2003 athletic awards ceremony. She received the Arthur Joseph "Pepper" Geddings, Jr. Athletic Leadership Award, one of the top honors a Wingate University student-athlete can receive. Also, Donald earned the C.B. and Beadie Haskins Scholarship Award, presented to the senior student-athlete with the highest grade point average.

In 2002, Donald won the Ann Hancock Scholarship. A member of the Phi Eta Sigma and Alpha Chi honor societies, Donald participates in the Leadership Fellows program at Wingate. She is involved with Habitat for Humanity, Special Olympics and Bulldog Helping Hands. She spent one year as a mentor with a local elementary student as part of the Bulldog Buddies program. Also, she works many local softball camps and clinics for children.

This summer, the NCAA has awarded 58 postgraduate scholarships of $6,900 each to 29 men and 29 women who participated in spring sports, which include baseball, men's and women's golf, men's and women's lacrosse, rowing, softball, men's and women's tennis, men's volleyball, outdoor track and field and women's water polo.

In addition to the spring sport honorees, the NCAA also awards 116 postgraduate scholarships to student-athletes participating in fall and winter sports in which the NCAA conducts championships, for a total of 174 postgraduate scholarships annually.

To qualify for an NCAA postgraduate scholarship, a student-athlete must have an overall grade-point average of 3.200 (on a 4.000 scale) or its equivalent and must have performed with distinction as a member of the varsity team in the sport in which the student-athlete was nominated.

The student-athlete must have behaved, both on and off the field, in a manner that has brought credit to the student-athlete, the institution and intercollegiate athletics. The student-athlete also must intend to continue academic work beyond the baccalaureate degree as a full-time or part-time graduate student.