Twenty Virginia State University student-athletes are being recognized as the recipients of the Division 2 Athletics Directors Association (D2ADA) 2011-12 Academic Achievement Awards. The Academic Achievement Awards is a program that recognizes the academic accomplishments of the student-athletes at the Division 2 level.
 
Lady Trojans award winners were cheerleading’s Cassandra Artis-Williams (Portsmouth, VA), volleyball’s Meagan Whiten (Baton Rouge, LA), women’s basketball’s Ashley Whitaker (Petersburg, VA), Marquilla Evans (Portsmouth, VA), Theresa Alexander (Fort Lauderdale, FL), and Yashica Blackney (Greenville, SC), bowling’s Kiara Raiford (New York, NY) and Latoya Gee (Petersburg, VA), softball’s Sharron Lipford (Largo, MD) and Caitlin Underhill (Colonial Heights, VA), track and field’s Jourdan Johnson (Winston-Salem, NC) and Dezstini Howard (Kansas City, MO), and volleyball’s Brianna Clark (Lakewood, NJ), Whitley Bradley (San Antonio, TX), Akirah Crawford (Newark, NJ), and Jasmine Henderson (St. Louis, MO).
 
Trojans award winners included men’s tennis Emmanuel Haug (Munich, Germany), baseball’s Brandon Cooper (Richmond, VA), men’s basketball’s Richard Hall (Bayshore, NY), and golf’s Stephen Genchi (Jupiter, FL).

A record number of institutions (118) and student-athletes (4,492) are being recognized for the 2011-12 Academic Achievement Awards. "The D2ADA would like to thank and congratulate the institutions that took part in honoring the record-number of 4,492 student-athletes with 2011-12 Academic Achievement Awards," stated D2ADA President Anita Barker, director of athletics at Chico State University. "Recognizing and honoring deserving Division 2 student-athletes is a strategic goal of the D2ADA. This award gives us the platform to showcase these individuals and their efforts in the classroom, as well as on the playing field."