HAMMOND – Southeastern Louisiana men's track and field student-athlete Cory Roberts and women's soccer student-athlete Dana Mayer are two of the three Southland Conference student-athletes that have been awarded the F.L. McDonald Postgraduate Scholarship, presented by Capital One Bank the league office announced on Tuesday.

Mayer, Roberts and Texas State women's soccer student-athlete Jessica Smith all received the league's ultimate academic honor for its top graduates. The award is presented annually to graduating male and female letterwinners with the highest cumulative grade-point averages during their enrollment at Southland Conference universities. The $2,500 scholarship must be applied to graduate study at an institution of the recipient's choice.

Mayer and Roberts are the fourth and fifth Southeastern student-athletes to receive the McDonald Scholarship. Previous recipients were Kim Kwolek (women's soccer, 2000), Milos Vasovic (men's tennis, 2004) and Janice Ezegbunam (women's track and field, 2004). Both Roberts and Mayer are biological sciences majors and had their degrees conferred last Saturday with Mayer receiving the university's highest academic honor, the President's Medal for Academic Excellence.

While Roberts, a 3.84 student from Meraux who prepped at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Hammond, was unable to participate in last weekend's commencement exercises, Saturday was a special day for the Lion decathlete. Posting the second-highest point total (7,923) in the event's history, Roberts repeated as Southland Conference outdoor champion in the decathlon and broke his own school record (7,451) set in 2009.

At the 2010 championships in Arlington, he placed in the top three in seven of the 10 events with first-place marks in the 400 and 1,500-meter runs and the 110-meter hurdles. Following the Lions' conference championship at the 2009 outdoor meet, Roberts was named the Southland Conference Student-Athlete of the Year for outdoor track and field. He also was selected to the CoSIDA/ESPN the Magazine Academic All-District VI first-team in 2009. Roberts has been accepted to the LSU Medical School in New Orleans, La., where he will continue his study in medicine.

Much like Roberts, Mayer is no stranger to academic honors. The 2009 Southland Conference Women's Soccer Student-Athlete of the Year, the Toronto, Ont. native has been named to the CoSIDA/ESPN the Magazine Academic All-District VI and Southland Conference All-Academic teams in each of the past three seasons. A first team All-Southland Conference defender in 2009, Mayer led a Southeastern defense that set the conference single-season records for shutouts (13) and fewest goals allowed (13). She helped the Lady Lions to their first conference tournament title and NCAA tournament berth to finish her collegiate career ranked second in school history with 78 matches played. Mayer will be involved with stem cell research at the University of Toronto before beginning medical school in the Fall of 2011.

The award was established in memory of Dr. F.L. McDonald in 1996-97, a former president of Lamar University and 1999 Southland Hall of Honor inductee. McDonald served as Lamar's president in 1963 when the Southland Conference was established and is considered one of the league's founding fathers.

Each member institution may nominate one male and one female student-athlete who meet the following criteria: a letterwinner in a conference sport, be on track to graduate during the spring in which they are nominated or the subsequent summer, and plan to attend graduate school no later than the second fall following the receipt of the award. Each student-athlete's accomplishment will be celebrated during the Southland Honors Ceremony June 3 in Galveston, Texas.