San Francisco, CA -- Racking up yet another series of awards to add to her ever-expanding trophy case, former Academy of Art University women's golfer Andrea Nieto got two items of good news recently. Last week she was recognized for her textile work by the Royal Society of Arts U.S Student Design Awards, and also received word that she was nominated for the NCAA Woman of the Year award, an award that recognizes not only the athletics achievements of outstanding young women, but also their academic achievements, community service and leadership.

"This year has been a great year for me and I'm grateful for all the guidance and mentoring that I have received from Rhona Mckenzie and Simon Ungless," said Nieto. "I also feel very honored to be nominated to such an award. I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to be an Urban Knight and represent the school with the women's golf team. I'm graduating which is a little bit bittersweet but I take with me the best memories of my artist-athlete experience that ART U gave me."

Nieto, who only just was named as a finalist for the prestigious Geoffrey Beene Scholarship Award in March, continued to wow industry professionals with her work, receiving the Pointcarre Software Prize for Textile Design for her work and will be featured in the Showcase section of the RSA Student Design Awards website as well as receive an invitation to attend an awards ceremony for the RSA in London this summer. 

Her nomination for Woman of the Year would be the crowning achievement on a stellar career, where she finished second place overall in the PacWest Tournament as a senior in 2013, earning a spot on the All-PacWest Third Team. That year she also made the PacWest Academic All-Conference Team and won the D2ADA Academic Achievement Award, which she also won in 2010-11. On the professional side, she also scored an internship with BCBGMAXAZRIA in 2013 and an internship at Pottery Barn here in 2014. She earned a sparkling 3.89 GPA as an undergraduate in textile design, and was a resident assistant as well as an assistant coach with the golf team this season.