AUSTIN, Texas – Cierra Foster of Oklahoma City University attained academic all-American® as voted upon by the College Sports Information Directors of America.

Foster, a senior from Post Falls, Idaho, made the NAIA women's at-large academic all-American second team. The Stars own 90 CoSIDA academic all-Americans, and Foster became OCU's first women's wrestler to join those ranks.

Foster owns a 3.80 cumulative grade-point average studying chemistry and mathematics. During summer 2020, Foster performed research through an online program at the University of Nebraska. From home, Foster, a chemistry and mathematics major, calculated how elastic samples respond to stretching and relaxing after undergoing surface chemical reactions. Her research was funded by a National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates grant as directed by Professor Stephen Morin and graduate mentor Ali Mazaltarim. Foster will attend the Ohio State University's chemistry PhD program and wrestle for the Ohio State regional training center in the fall.

The Stars named Foster their 2020-21 female student-athlete of the year with the Jim Wade Award. She recorded an 8-2 mark with a fifth-place finish in the NAIA Invitational, Sooner Athletic Conference 155-pound championship, SAC wrestler of the week for Feb. 1-7 and the Grand View Open title during 2020-21. Foster registered an 18-9 record with two NAIA all-American honors during her career. Her academic honors include NAIA scholar-athlete, SAC scholar-athlete, two academic all-SAC nods and three conference commissioner's honor roll honors.

Oklahoma City student-athletes thrive both in competition and in the classroom. The Stars produced their best combined GPA of the past decade (3.332) in 2020-21. OCU extended its string of winning at least one national title to 28 years dating back to 1993-94 after taking the 2021 NAIA competitive cheerleading championship. OCU has won 70 national championships in all sports with three Directors' Cup titles (2016-17, '17-18 and '18-19).

CoSIDA began the distinguished academic all-America® program in 1952, and since then, has honored thousands of deserving student-athletes from numerous sports across all divisions with these elite academic all-America® scholar-athlete honors. The NAIA women's at-large academic all-American team includes student-athletes who compete in beach volleyball, bowling, competitive cheerleading, competitive dance, golf, lacrosse, swimming, tennis and wrestling.

To be eligible for academic all-America® consideration, a student-athlete must be a varsity starter or key reserve, maintain a cumulative GPA of 3.30 on a scale of 4.00, have reached sophomore athletic and academic standings at his/her current institution and be nominated by his/her sports information director.