2025-26 NCAA POSTGRADUATE SCHOLARSHIP RECIPIENTS
ALL-TIME MIAC NCAA POSTGRADUATE RECIPIENTS

ARDEN HILLS, MINN.—Bethel University women's track & field graduate student AnnaGrace Nelson earned the prestigious 2025-26 NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship. Nelson is among 21 female winter student-athletes across all levels of the NCAA to earn the scholarship in 2025-26. She became the 11th BU female, and the 20th student-athlete in school history to earn the distinction. The last Bethel Royal to earn the NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship was Emily Rossing (women's volleyball) in 2023. 

The NCAA awarded a $10,000 postgraduate scholarship to 42 student-athletes, 21 each gender, to student-athletes like Nelson who've demonstrated academic and athletic excellence, and stellar leadership throughout their collegiate careers. The postgraduate scholarships are distributed three times into fall, winter, and spring. Her scholarship falls under the winter category as a women's indoor track & field student-athlete. 

Nelson, a native of Cambridge, Minnesota, had a 3.98 cumulative grade point average as a double major in psychology and communication, as well as a minor in biology. Her 1,046 hours of community service occurred via United Worship Ministries, Team Spring Break Service Project, track & field bible study, USATF National Meet set up/tear down, mental health education with river counseling, Bethel University Welcome Week, Inner City Christian Ministries Life Center Halloween Outreach, First Baptist Church - Cambridge Youth Retreat, Feed My Starving Children, and Redemption Church. 

Nelson is a three-time MIAC Winter/Spring Academic All-Conference selection, as well as a three-time United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) NCAA Division III All-Academic Athlete in 2021, 2022, and 2024. To earn USTFCCCA All-Academic Athlete, a student-athlete must obtain a minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.30 on a 4.0 scale through the most recent completed grading period, and be ranked among the top 50 individual in their event. 

Among those rankings were in 2023-24, when she was No. 20 in the indoor pentathlon, No. 40 in the indoor high jump, No. 47 in the indoor triple jump, and No. 40 in the outdoor heptathlon. That No. 40 heptathlon ranking consisted of a school-record 4264 points, which secured Nelson the 2024 MIAC Women's Outdoor Heptathlon Championship. That mark came on the heels of an indoor season that saw Nelson qualify for the 2024 NCAA Division III Women's Indoor Track & Field Championship, where she took 10th place in the pentathlon with a 3277. She entered that national championship fresh off a school-record 3327 (at the time) at the Wartburg Last Chance Meet. Those marks culminated in Nelson being named the 2024 MIAC Women's Indoor Field Athlete of the Year.

"It was those meets that resulted in a broken school record and even heavier pressure," said AnnaGrace Nelson. "The demands of a pentathlete/heptathlete are daunting, ceaseless preparation, and no room to hide from weaknesses. After a studying abroad during my junior year in 2024-25, I decided to stop the multis to focus on individual events."

The decision to focus on individual events resulted in success for Nelson, who concluded her collegiate career winning the 2026 MIAC Outdoor Pole Vault with a school-record 3.63m.

Nelson won the 2022 and 2024 MIAC Indoor Women's High Jump Championships, which round out her four career MIAC titles. 

"Fully capturing my educational and athletic journey is difficult because of how profoundly it has shaped my life," said Nelson. "My coaches trained, encouraged, and disciplined me into a better athlete and human being. They helped me discover how to fight fear with confidence and determination, and how to redefine failure through perseverance when things don't go as planned."