Matthew Sheffield, Georgiana alumnus and former starting pitcher of the Panthers varsity baseball team, will be pursuing his collegiate baseball career at Faulkner University in the coming fall.

Sheffield, who also served as valedictorian of the 2015 Georgiana School graduating class, considered a number of options for college.

Fortunately, he took the proactive approach with regards to obtaining a higher education, which made his final decision a great deal easier.

“I had a few junior college offers,” Sheffield said.

“But due to my number of college credit hours, I chose to go straight to a four-year institution.”

Thanks to dual enrollment in high school and college courses, Sheffield graduated from Georgiana with 32 hours, effectively skipping his freshman year.

Though he found balancing college and high school courses with extracurricular activities easy during the school year, the summer made things a bit more hectic.

“During the school year, I had (the college courses) as online courses, but during the summer, I had courses on campus in Andalusia,” Sheffield said.

“I played summer baseball in Troy, had workouts for football and had a job in Greenville.”

This summer has been a bit less complicated, though Sheffield is playing on a Major League Baseball scout team based in Montgomery in addition to two college courses in Greenville.

But all of the preparation will make the transition to Faulkner even smoother, though he already considers the school to be a great fit.

“Its proximity to home played a big factor in my decision, and the fact that they have an awesome Christian atmosphere,” Sheffield added.

“In the end, I had an awesome admissions counselor in Casey Crawford who constantly was after me to come to Faulkner.  Plus, in spite of all that, I get to live my dream of playing college baseball.”

Baseball was also a major decision in Sheffield’s college choice due to his deep love of the game, which also extends to his desire to coach.

“I’ve always loved helping kids learn something, but on the same note it’s a way for me and the game of baseball to stay together,” Sheffield said.

“It’s a way for me to pass my knowledge of the game on to someone else to see how far they will go with that knowledge.”

There are other aspects of college life that Sheffield finds equally exciting, including the freedom that comes with not being tethered to a classroom from 8 a.m. until 3 p.m. and the required development of time management and organizational skills.

But even while looking ahead to the future, Sheffield said that it’s his past at Georgiana that ultimately influenced him most.

“There were many times where I loved Georgiana, and there were many times where I did not love Georgiana,” Sheffield said.

“Overall, I think the lessons I learned from my teachers, club sponsors and coaches influenced me most—not only my college decision, but my major decision (secondary education) because I watched how great some of them were with students and how they influenced their lives.”