L-R—Pictured are MAT Cohort 1 graduates David “Tripp” Jones ’20; Caroline Dent; Elexis Arnold ’16; Kimberly Baker ’20; and Courtney “Coco” Burgess ’21.
Montgomery, Ala.—The Huntingdon College W. James Samford Jr. School of Graduate and Professional Studies celebrated the graduation of its first ever cohort of graduate students, Saturday, May 6. Five students completed the Master of Athletic Training degree.
“This is a historic occasion not only because of the nature of the ceremony, but also because this is the first time in the history of the College we will confer graduate degrees,” said Huntingdon President J. Cameron West in his remarks during 2023 Commencement Exercises. “Our five Master of Athletic Training graduates entered in the summer of 2021 and have persevered as our first class of graduate students. As they progressed, faculty and staff worked to secure the appropriate accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges and, just last month, from the Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education. Graduate students, you have written a new chapter in the life of the College. We thank you for being the pioneer graduate school class at Huntingdon College, and we thank the students, faculty, and staff who were involved in the work necessary to create this program and to lay the foundation for future graduate programs at this Home We Love So Well.”
Huntingdon’s Master of Athletic Training program is an intensive six-semester program that was announced in 2020. All five who entered as part of the first cohort of students in 2021 completed their work and graduated in the Class of 2023.
Graduates were:
- Elexis Arnold, Birmingham, Ala.
- Kimberly Baker, Birmingham, Ala.
- Courtney “Coco” Burgess, McKinney, Texas
- Caroline Dent, Tuscaloosa, Ala.
- David “Tripp” Jones III, Phenix City, Ala.
Huntingdon College, founded in 1854, is a coeducational residential liberal arts college of the United Methodist Church offering more than thirty undergraduate programs of study as well as the Master of Athletic Training program. MAT students benefit from hands-on experience in on-site internships during five of the six semesters of study, including serving with Huntingdon’s 21 NCAA-Division III athletic teams.
For more information, visit
www.huntingdon.edu/mat.
