Truman State University (Mo.) is the newest member of the Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC) after the league’s Council of Presidents voted unanimously Thursday to accept the Truman Bulldogs into the conference. The Bulldogs will begin play in the GLVC in all sports beginning in the fall of 2013, competing as the league’s 16th member.

“The GLVC Council of Presidents unanimously endorsed Truman State University’s application for membership because of their tremendous portfolio in both academics and athletics, which has been enhanced in recent years by the outstanding leadership of University President Troy Paino,” said Dr. Thomas George, Chancellor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and Chair of the GLVC Council of Presidents.

Truman will be the seventh Missouri school to join the GLVC since 1995 and the sixth to do so in the past eight years.  “This is an exciting time for the University and this move will not only help us establish and renew rivalries with fellow GLVC schools, but it will also bring the Bulldogs to areas in which we recruit students and have high concentrations of alumni,” said Director of Athletics Jerry Wollmering.  Truman will be joining three other GLVC schools who are among 24 institutions nationally that have more than a 90 percent academic success rate.

The GLVC was established in 1978 and is currently one of the largest NCAA Division II conferences in the country, featuring 16 schools and 18 sports, including the addition of football this fall. The conference was established primarily in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky but has moved westward to include four Illinois schools, six Missouri schools and one school from Wisconsin among its membership. The current members of the GLVC are: Bellarmine University (Louisville, Ky.), Drury University (Springfield, Mo.), Kentucky Wesleyan College (Owensboro, Ky.), Lewis University (Romeoville, Ill.), Maryville University (St. Louis, Mo.), McKendree University (Lebanon, Ill.), Missouri University of Science & Technology (Rolla, Mo.), Quincy University (Quincy, Ill.), Rockhurst University (Kansas City, Mo.), Saint Joseph’s College (Rensselaer, Ind.), University of Illinois Springfield (Springfield, Ill.), University of Indianapolis (Indianapolis, Ind.), University of Missouri-St. Louis (St. Louis, Mo.), University of Southern Indiana (Evansville, Ind.), University of Wisconsin-Parkside (Kenosha, Wis.) and William Jewell College (Liberty, Mo).



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