April 20 & 21, 2019

Dear Coaches, Athletes, and Families of Taekwondo,

Welcome to the 44th National Collegiate Taekwondo Championship!
On behalf of the National Collegiate Taekwondo Association (NCTA), it is my great pleasure to welcome you to the 44th National Collegiate Taekwondo Championship. The National Collegiate Taekwondo Championship has been dedicated to serve and motivate athletes to compete fairly. For the past 44 years, NCTA has been serving as a great pipeline and grassroots development for our national team and Olympic team members. Practicing taekwondo and developing stronger character results in a wonderful learning experience that positively affects not only the taekwondo community but society and our country overall.

As the National Collegiate Association for taekwondo, we will continue to preserve the excellence of taekwondo technical developments, martial arts’ philosophy, traditions, and educational values through various special events and international symposia. As practitioners of collegiate taekwondo, we must remember to embrace educational values of taekwondo training such as character building, mutual prosperity, self-confidence, and respect.

Furthermore, the 44th NCTA Championship is significant because we are presenting the 6th NCTA High School Championship as a pipeline for high performance athletes for NCTA so that in the future, these athletes can become one of many collegiate athletes that will serve as US National and Olympic team members. We hope high school athletes can become acquainted with college coaches and athletes so that they can continue their taekwondo career while they are pursuing academic endeavors in college.

The past 8 years has been such a wonderful learning experience for me to serve as the President of NCTA. I am grateful for our dedicated officials, medical staff, referees, coaches and the most importantly, athletes. I greatly appreciate those who helped not only support Team USA but also traveling together as one of the most prominent collegiate associations in the world.

I am also proud of our collegiate athletes who competed with great dedication for the country and the NCTA. It has been such a wonderful privilege and a great honor to work with the such intelligent and passionate group of people. Even though I am stepping down as the President of the organization, I will continue to support and cheer for our National Collegiate Taekwondo Association and the athletes.

I must take this opportunity to thank the dedicated NCTA officials, our tournament committee, the dedicated University of Texas-Austin’s Organizing Committee for preparing and running our 44th National Collegiate Championship as well as our sponsors, referees, medical staff, and volunteers for elevating the tournament’s reputation of continued excellence.

Best wishes to all athletes, coaches, and families!

Russell Ahn, Ph.D.
President, U.S. National Collegiate Taekwondo Association