ST. LOUIS – Women's track and cross country student-athlete Sarah Poltrack has been named a 2020 Missouri Valley Conference postgraduate scholarship winner as announced by Commissioner Doug Elgin.  The Missouri Valley Conference Faculty Athletics Representatives Committee voted to award postgraduate scholarships to a total of four student-athletes, due to their exemplary academic and athletic performances.  Each will receive a $5,000 postgraduate scholarship from the Conference.
 
"Sarah is the one of the best Student Athletes I have ever coached. Aside from the 4.0 GPA, Sarah put forth the effort on the cross country course and track to continue to set new personal records each year," UE head cross country/track and field coach Don Walters exclaimed.  "Her leadership and ability to succeed has been outstanding. Everyone has been moved and became a better Student Athlete while watching and learning from the determination that she instilled every day. I wish her the best and will miss her every day.  I extend my congratulations to her for earning this prestigious award."
 
UE Senior Associate Athletic Director Sarah Solinsky echoed those sentiments.
 
"While Sarah's time on campus was shorter than most, her impact far surpassed many," Solinsky said.  "She epitomized what a student-athlete can be in balancing her time commitments for athletics, pursuing excellence in the classroom graduating with a 4.0 in three years, while serving our campus and Evansville community."
 
Poltrack, a native of Batesville, Ind., ran distance and middle distance for the Evansville women's track squad and also ran cross country at UE.  She earned student-athlete academic honors and was on the Dean's List all four years, completing her undergraduate degree with a perfect 4.0 cumulative grade point average while majoring in pre-physical therapy, public health.
 
"Coach Walters has been a very influential person for me.  I think that a lot of the things that he emphasizes to his athletes are things that I have come to value: academics, community service, working hard when nobody was looking and representing yourself and organization with pride," Poltrack said.  "When we did something well, he said this is what it is about and why we are here.  Everything that I learned while at the University of Evansville will help me in the future."
 
While at Evansville, she served as a member of the student-athlete advisory committee and faculty senate athletics committee and was active in volunteer activities, including work at the Cincinnati V.A. Hospital and with Habitat for Humanity.  Poltrack will be attending VCU to pursue a doctorate in physical therapy.  She is slated to begin her work there in mid-June.  An important factor that helped her to earn the opportunity at VCU was a research project that she did last summer, which examined provider retention and recruitment in rural areas.  Her work was presented at the World Rural Health Conference.
 
One of the primary goals of Poltrack is to use her degree to work with military veterans.  Both of her parents served in the Navy and her twin sister currently attends the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.  Being able to combine that with the healthcare field was also important with both of her parents currently working in the industry.
 
"The work that my family has done really led me to that decision," Poltrack added.  "I was able to do some volunteer work at the Cincinnati VA and it reaffirmed my desire to work with military veterans.  They have given so much and I want to give back."
 

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