Wellesley Athletics

Wellesley’s Arfsten Earns NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship

WELLESLEY, Mass. – Wellesley College senior Marret Arfsten, a two-time National Field Hockey Coaches Association National All-America and three-year member of the NFHCA National Academic Squad, has been selected as an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship winner, one of the NCAA’s most prestigious academic honors.

Arfsten is one of 58 student-athletes across all NCAA fall sports (men’s and women’s cross-country, field hockey, football, men’s and women’s soccer, women’s volleyball and men’s waterpolo) - Divisions I, II, III – and one of 29 female student-athletes to earn the scholarship.

Arfsten, a senior Political Science major from Moorestown, N.J., carries a 3.74 grade point average and is one of the most honored players in Wellesley field hockey history earning accolades both on and off the field. Arfsten, the 2002 New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference Player of the Year, led Wellesley to the 2002 NEWMAC Field Hockey Championship and a berth to the NCAA Division III Field Hockey Tournament. A three-year member of the NEWMAC Academic All-Conference team, Arfsten has taken her place in several Wellesley College field hockey records and is Wellesley’s career leader in goals scored with 48.

Arfsten has been actively involved in the college’s academic community, serving as the chair of the Phi Sigma Lecture Society and serving as a planning assistant for a three-day conference entitled “Women Shaping Foreign Policy”. Arfsten plans to attend Oxford University in the fall and will pursue a master’s degree in European Politics and Society. She intends on earning a doctorate in the same discipline and hopes to enter the field of academia.

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.