Italy Lady Gladiator basketball senior Kaitlyn Rossa, a six-foot shooting forward, will be trading in her gladiator helmet for a pirate’s hat next fall now that she has verbally committed to Southwestern University located in Georgetown, Texas.

With four-years of varsity playing experience at Italy High School and two seasons as an AAU select player for Higher Authority and Texas Express, coached by Corsicana’s current head girls basketball coach, Art Prevost, a former D-1 assistant coach, Rossa will be packing up her winning attitude and strong work ethic to join the Southwestern Lady Pirates while attending the university as a law student.

“I was impressed with Southwestern academically, and when visiting during student orientation, I fell in love with the campus,” commented Rossa with the eagerness of a soon-to-be college freshman.

About Southwestern:
The oldest university in Texas, established in 1840, Southwestern University (also referred to as Southwestern or SU) is a private, four-year, undergraduate, liberal arts college. The school is affiliated with the United Methodist Church although the curriculum is nonsectarian. Southwestern, in the liberal arts tradition, engages minds and transforms lives through intellectual, cultural, and social experiences on campus, in the community, and abroad.

A residential campus bordering dynamic Austin and the beautiful Texas Hill Country has a 10:1 student/faculty ratio; average class size of 14 and the innovative Paideia Program. More than fifty percent of students study abroad or participate in an off-campus program, with opportunities including New York Arts, Washington, D.C., politics and London semesters; summer biology research; department and professional internships, both domestic and abroad; summer programs in Germany, Mexico, England, Jamaica and Turkey; access to universities around the world through several major international study abroad organizations. Students volunteer at twice the national average.

Southwestern became a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division III school for the 1992-1993 academic year and then joined the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) in 1993 and competed within the conference beginning in the fall of 1994. Since that time the Pirates have aided the SCAC in becoming one of the most well-recognized and well-respected conferences in the nation.

Majors and Opportunities:
Students can choose from 40 majors, and participate in pre-professional and certification programs in medicine, law, education, engineering and theology. Southwestern confers: Bachelor’s of Arts, Science, Music and Fine Arts.

Southwestern’s nationally recognized Paideia Program helps students make connections between what they are learning in the classroom and the world around them. In addition to a rigorous academic curriculum, program participants fulfill requirements in civic engagement, intercultural and diversity experiences, and undergraduate research and creative works.

Southwestern was named to Forbes Magazine’s America’s Best Colleges with a #133 ranking in 2011.

Sounds like Rossa will be having an amazing collegiate experience both on and off the hardwood.

Southwestern University Campus:
1001 E. University Avenue
Georgetown, TX 78626
(512) 863-6511

Go, Ro!