Getting the values from a Datatable column

I couldn't find any better, reusable way to get all the values from a specific column of a datatable, strongly typed than the snippet below:

        internal class DataColumnConverter<T>
        {
            internal T[] GetValuesAsArray(DataTable data, string columnName)
            {
                List<T> values = new List<T>();
                foreach (DataRow r in data.Rows)
                {
                    values.Add((T)r[columnName]);
                }
                return values.ToArray();
            }
        }

Things it's missing:

• Type Cast checking on the type of items in the DataTables' column that's specified
• Checking that the column specified exists
• Handling of a column which contains nullable values (Could <T> be passed as, for example int? to cater for this? maybe! Or perhaps null's could be stripped out...)