Sequoyah Graduate Wins National Merit Scholarship

HICKORY FLAT, GA -- On Wednesday, the National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced more than 3,200 winners of National Merit Scholarships financed by U.S. colleges and universities. Officials of each sponsor college selected their scholarship winners from among the finalists in the 2017 National Merit Scholarship Program who plan to attend their institution.

Katie Bates, a class of 2017 graduate of Sequoyah High School in Hickory Flat, is among the select group of winners chosen for 2017.

These awards provide between $500 and $2,000 annually for up to four years of undergraduate study at the institution financing the scholarship. An additional group of scholars will be announced in July, bringing the total number of college-sponsored Merit Scholarship recipients in the 2017 competition to approximately 4,000.

This year, 182 higher education institutions are underwriting Merit Scholarship awards through the National Merit Scholarship Program. Sponsor colleges and universities include 103 private and 79 public institutions located in 44 states and the District of Columbia.

College-sponsored Merit Scholarship winners announced this week are a part of the distinguished group of about 7,500 high school seniors who will receive National Merit Scholarships for college undergraduate study worth over $32 million. Earlier this spring, NMSC announced winners of corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards and National Merit $2,500 Scholarships.

Over 1.6 million juniors in more than 22,000 high schools entered the 2017 National Merit Scholarship competition when they took the 2015 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

Last fall, about 16,000 semifinalists were named on a state-representational basis in numbers proportional to each state’s percentage of the national total of graduating high school seniors. Semifinalists were the highest-scoring program entrants in each state and represented less than one percent of the nation’s seniors.

To compete for Merit Scholarship awards, semifinalists first had to advance to the finalist level of the competition by fulfilling additional requirements. Each semifinalist was asked to submit a detailed scholarship application, which included writing an essay and providing information about extracurricular activities, awards, and leadership positions.

Semifinalists also had to have an outstanding academic record, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, and earn SAT scores that confirmed the qualifying test performance.

From the semifinalist group, some 15,000 met requirements for Finalist standing, and about half of the Finalists will be Merit Scholarship winners in 2017.

Image via Cherokee County School District