Award honors female student-athletes for academics, athletics, service and leadership
Millikin University Athletics in conjunction with the NCAA is pleased to announce that May 2020 graduate and former Big Blue softball standout Kalli Farmer, of Columbia, Ill., has been selected as a nominee for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year Award.
NCAA member schools have nominated a record 605 female college athletes for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year Award. Farmer is a shining example of the four pillars of the Woman of the Year Award: academics, athletics, service and leadership. A Millikin Presidential Scholar, Farmer graduated in May with a near perfect grade point average with a degree in sports management with minors in digital media marketing and business administration.
Throughout her college career Farmer was recognized for her outstanding work on the softball field and in the classroom. In 2020, she was named to the CoSIDA Academic All-America® NCAA Division III Softball First Team after receiving Third Team honors as a junior. Farmer earned College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW) Academic All-Conference honors four times and was the Jack Swartz Award Winner in 2019 and 2020. Farmer received the CCIW's Merle Chapman Award for Leadership in 2020.
On the field, Farmer batted .488 with 12 RBI in 13 games during the 2020 season. For her career, Farmer hit .399 with 76 RBI. Farmer was named to the CCIW All-Conference First Team in 2018 and 2019, and was a Second Team selection in 2017.
Farmer was named to the NFCA All-Region First Team in 2019. In 2018, Farmer was the NCAA Statistical Champion for Toughest to Strikeout with zero strikeouts at the plate that season. In 2019, Farmer was selected the Big Blue Softball team's Most Valuable Player and named the Millikin Athletic Department's Student Athlete of the Year.
Farmer was active in the Millikin and Decatur, Ill., community. Her commitments included being the founder and leader of the Millikin chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletics and an active member of the Big Blue's Student Athlete Advisory Committee.
Rooted in Title IX, the NCAA Woman of the Year Award was established in 1991 to recognize graduating female student-athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in academics, athletics, service and leadership throughout their collegiate careers.
The nominees represent all three NCAA divisions, including 259 nominees from Division I, 126 from Division II and 220 from Division III. Nominees competed in 24 sports, with multisport student-athletes accounting for 128 of the nominees.
Member schools are encouraged to honor their top graduating female college athletes each year by submitting their names for consideration for the Woman of the Year Award.
Conference offices will select up to two nominees each from their pool of member school nominees. The CCIW nominees will be announced later this month. Then, the Woman of the Year selection committee, made up of representatives from the NCAA membership, will choose the Top 30 honorees — 10 from each division. From the Top 30, the Woman of the Year selection committee will determine the top three honorees in each division and announce nine finalists. The NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics then will choose the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year, who will be named this fall.