Darien Students Named 2024 National Merit Scholarship Semifinalists

DARIEN, CT — Four Darien High School students have been named as semifinalists in the 69th annual National Merit Scholarship Program.

According to a news release from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, more than 16,000 semifinalists were named on Wednesday. They will continue to compete for 7,140 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $28 million that will be offered next spring.

The students from DHS are:

• Alicia Daly
• Sydney Du
• Bo-Jun Qin
• Grant Wang

"We are so proud of this exceptional group of students and wish them well as the process moves forward," said DHS Principal Ellen Dunn in a news release from the school.

Over 1.3 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools entered the 2024 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2022 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.

From over 16,000 semifinalists, more than 15,000, or 95 percent of semifinalists, are expected to advance to the finalist level, and approximately half of the finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.

Students will be notified of this designation in February.

To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition.

The semifinalist and a high school official must submit a detailed scholarship application, in which they provide information about the semifinalist’s academic record, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment, and honors and awards received.

A semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and earn SAT or ACT scores that confirm the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test.

All scholarships are underwritten by NMSC with its own funds and by approximately 320 business organizations and higher education institutions that share NMSC’s goals of honoring the nation’s scholastic champions and encouraging the pursuit of academic excellence.