Hochstedler Awarded NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship

Hochstedler Awarded NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship

(INDIANAPOLIS, Ind.) – Carnegie Mellon University senior swimmer Kim Hochstedler (Mishawaka, Ind. / Penn) was selected as one of the 29 women's winter sport recipients of the NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship for excelling academically and athletically while showing leadership and commitment to the community. Hochstedler is the 12th Tartan to receive the award since 2007.

Each of the honorees will receive a one-time $7,500 scholarship, to be used for postgraduate study within three years. The Association awards up to 174 postgraduate scholarships annually, 87 for men and 87 for women. Fifty-eight (29 men, 29 women) scholarships are announced after each fall, winter, and spring sports season and stretch across NCAA Division I, II, and III institutions. Women's winter sports sponsored by the NCAA include basketball, fencing, gymnastics, ice hockey, indoor track and field, rifle, skiing, and swimming and diving.

The NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship was created in 1964 to promote and encourage postgraduate education by rewarding the Association's most accomplished student-athletes through their participation in NCAA championship and/or emerging sports.

Hochstedler's swimming career came to a close at the 2018 NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships where she earned All-America honors in the 200-yard breaststroke after finishing fifth overall in a school record time of 2:16.97. At the championship meet, Hochstedler also finished in the top 16 of the 100-yard breaststroke and 400-yard medley relay. It was her third trip to the NCAA meet where she accumulated four top 16 performances for her career.

The senior will graduate with four school records while leading the program to its best NCAA finish – 15th at this year's championships. She also was a University Athletic Association (UAA) Champion in the 200-yard breaststroke this season, the first since 2012 for the women's swimming and diving team.

Away from the water, Hochstedler is a 4.0 student who will graduate with a degree in psychology and statistics. She's received numerous awards this year including the Dr. William Brown Academic Athletic Achievement Award given to the male and female student-athletes who are four-year participants and earned the highest grade-point average while participating in intercollegiate athletics.

The recipient of the Carnegie Mellon Women's Association Dietrich College Scholarship Award and the 2018 Gretchen Goldsmith Lankford Prize, Hochstedler will be continuing her academic pursuits as a Biostatistics PhD candidate at the University of Michigan.

In the fall, Hochstedler was selected as an Andrew Carnegie Society Scholar and is a Phi Beta Kappa inductee this spring.

Last year, Hochstedler was named a CoSIDA Academic All-American and has been nominated once again this year. In addition to her academic dedication, the Indiana native has committed numerous hours to community involvement. As a member of SAAC for three years, she held the role of community service chair, volunteered to run the aquatics venue for Special Olympics twice, and has been an outreach coordinator and counselor at Camp Kesem.

She's been a three-year student researcher in the gender, relationships, and health lab, a data analysis intern for CMU's Software Engineering Institute, and interned with the National Institutes of Health in the epidemiology branch. You could often find Hochstedler in the aquatics area lifeguarding or teaching swim lessons. Her senior year, she served as a teaching assistant for Social Psychology and Biological Foundations of Behavior.