Matthew Valentine

Matthew Valentine (’22) is currently earning a master’s degree in marriage and family therapy at Utah Tech University. Valentine wants to become a licensed mental health counselor with plans to travel as a motivational speaker and life coach.

In addition to guidance from Assistant Director of Student Success Michael Frye, Valentine named psychology professors Jeff Batis, Michael Gibbons, and Alan Whitehead as personal mentors who helped him select the best school for his interests and prepared him in their upper-level psychology courses for the rigors of graduate work.

“Professor Batis has shown me what a graduate-school course looks like as he treated my senior capstone course as such,” said Valentine. “I am well prepared. I’m so grateful for these great mentors.”

Along with being a psychology major at Southern Virginia University, Valentine was a running back on the Knight’s football team and ran on the men’s track and field team—which recently won both the indoor and outdoor USA South Conference Championships. Valentine was also initiated into the Phi Kappa Phi National Honor Society this past spring semester.

“The thing I value most about my time at [Southern Virginia] and what I will carry forward with me into my bright future is the friends that I have made,” said Valentine. “ [Now], I am most excited about moving to another state, making new friends, and learning more about the mental health field.”