{"id":45310,"date":"2017-04-27T08:52:22","date_gmt":"2017-04-27T12:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=45310"},"modified":"2017-07-10T11:18:34","modified_gmt":"2017-07-10T15:18:34","slug":"smashing-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2017\/04\/27\/smashing-success\/","title":{"rendered":"Smashing success"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Vanessa Madrigal enrolled at Wright State to play on the tennis team and study biomedical engineering in the College of Engineering and Computer Science. (Photos by Will Jones)<\/p><\/div>\n

She carries a 3.8 GPA in biomedical engineering<\/a> while also playing on the Wright State University tennis team.<\/p>\n

Vanessa Madrigal\u2019s success on the court and in the classroom exemplifies the Department of Intercollegiate Athletics<\/a>\u2019 emphasis on academics and its longtime commitment to helping student-athletes be successful and productive after Wright State.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe bring people in here with the idea of making them better people,\u201d said Athletics Director Bob Grant. \u201cWe\u2019ve got a very defined mission statement that we simply call PSA. It means we take our student-athletes as people first, as students second, as athletes third. Our thinking is that a well-balanced, happy student-athlete is more productive not only here as an athlete but more importantly academically and in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

For 45 straight terms, Wright State student-athletes as a group have posted an average GPA of 3.0 or higher. Last fall, student-athletes had an average GPA of 3.26 compared to a 2.89 GPA for students universitywide.<\/p>\n

And 88 percent of student-athletes graduate, highest in the school\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the while, they are juggling full-time athletics with a full-time academic load,\u201d said Grant. \u201cSo it\u2019s really impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Student-athletes have the benefit of three academic-support advisers. And the Setzer Pavilion\/Mills Morgan Center gives the basketball teams a landing spot for academic support as well as study lounges and access to the internet. It also enables the teams to practice with flexibility around class time.<\/p>\n

But Grant believes the biggest factor in the academic success of student-athletes is the culture that has been instilled.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think they know coming in it\u2019s a priority for us; it\u2019s non-negotiable,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I think the culture has taken hold. When you walk into a place and all of your teammates are taking something seriously, you tend to fall in line. So it\u2019s become almost a tradition.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Madrigal grew up in Highland, Indiana, just southeast of Chicago. Her father is an operating engineer and her mother a tennis instructor at a tennis club. Madrigal first picked up a racket when she was 6 and two years later was playing competitive tennis.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a very competitive person,\u201d she said. \u201cI could have been put into any sport and just loved the competition.\u201d<\/p>\n

One thing tennis teaches is how to deal with and grow from losing, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very mental game,\u201d she said. \u201cEven though I would get frustrated, I just fell in love with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

After graduating from Highland High School in 2013, Madrigal chose to enroll at Wright State to play on the tennis team<\/a> and study biomedical engineering in the College of Engineering and Computer Science<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew I wanted to do some type of engineering because I love the math and science growing up,\u201d said Madrigal, a senior.<\/p>\n

Her twin sister, Abigail, is studying business at Wright State and also plays on the team.<\/p>\n

Madrigal said one secret to her success in both tennis and her studies is limiting her social life and being laser focused on tennis and academics.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am self-driven,\u201d she said. \u201cI love playing a sport I\u2019m extremely passionate about, and I love being in an academic field I\u2019m passionate about. I have fun when I\u2019m studying. I mean it\u2019s difficult and there is a lot of crying, but I would rather do that than anything else. I get excited when I try to figure out a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

Madrigal said the athletics department puts a heavy emphasis on academics. She said the advisers are instrumental in helping student-athletes plan their class schedules, in helping minimize the missing of classes for athletic contests and of making sure the students hand in assignments or make up their work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a balance of the classes and a balance of the tennis,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vanessa Madrigal enrolled at Wright State to play on the tennis team and study biomedical engineering in the College of Engineering and Computer Science. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":45316,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,4266,743,715,4298],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-biomedical-industrial-and-human-factors-engineering","category-engineering-computer-science","category-news","category-student-profile"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45310"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45310\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45339,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45310\/revisions\/45339"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}