Naperville, Aurora Students Named National Merit Semifinalists

NAPERVILLE, IL — The National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced Wednesday 16,000 semifinalists in the 62nd annual National Merit Scholarship Program, including several from Naperville and Aurora schools.

Naperville Central High School had 10 seniors named as semifinalists, and Naperville North had 22. The students now have the opportunity to continue in the competition for 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth about $33 million that will be offered next spring.

The 22 seniors from Naperville North are: Jamal Ahmed, Jane Boettcher, Jonathan Gao, Artur Genser, Byron Gore, Michael Green, Dillon Hammond, Rachel He, Meghna Israni, Nicole Kolbasov, Kelvin Li, Chen
Ling, Frances McCormick, Jakob Myers, Christopher Ng, Stacey Ni, Michael Rotter, Nikhilesh Sivapatham, Olivia Tsao, Jesse Wang, Lillian Yuan and Vivian Yuan.

The 10 students from Naperville Central are: Sara Campbell, Dylan Hale, Trevor Hale, Rick Li, Eric Lo, David Schneck, Christina Vasquez, Emily Whirledge, William Zhang, and Annie Zhou.

At Metea Valley, the semifinalists are: Kalpa Anjur, Kavya Anjur, Rohin Bhasin, Michael Chen, Dean Chou, Christopher Danner, James Drayton, Samyuktha Iyer, Julia Jansen, Kieran Kaempen, Lori Kipp, Arpan Laha, Jungin Lee, Shreyas Mohan, Sung-Keun Park, Vishal Prakash, SandhyaSivakumar, John Tjards and Allison Yu.

Waubonsie Valley High School's students were not listed online, but according to the Chicago Tribune, they are: Hana Ahmed, Corey Barker, Edward Guan, Tiffany Kuta, Kelley Powell, Aashna Shah and Serena Zhu. A
phone message left with the school seeking confirmation of th names was not immediately returned.

At Neuqua Valley High School, the following students were named semifinalists: Utkarsh Awasthi, Aakash Basu, Vanessa J. Cai, Dustin M. Chen, Jessica J. Chen, Lydia S. Chung, Tejas V. Gajula, Grace L. Hong, Arnold Huang, Thomas Huang, Michael V. Ji, Janani R. Kalyan, Aishwarya L. Katiki, Amber S. Keahey, Anna Li, Avni Limdi, Rishab T. Nagori, Vishal S. Narasimhan, Lokesh Nasaka, Jessica

From Benet Academy: Olivia Crabtree, James Dourdourekas, Michael Dunn , Noah Helm, Elizabeth Keefe, Mark Moran, Michael O’Grady, Jack Riedl, Jonathan Sutkowski and Dirk Wallace.

About 1.6 million juniors in more than 22,000 high schools entered the 2017 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2015 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants, according to a news release from Naperville School District 203. 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.

Semifinalists are chosen by their high scores on the 2015 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualify Test (PSAT/NMSQT) and represent less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors. These academically talented students will have the opportunity to continue in competition for some 7,500 National Merit scholarship awards worth $33 million that will be offered next spring.

To become a finalist, the semifinalist and his or her high school 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.

From the approximately 16,000 semifinalists, about 15,000 are expected to advance to the Finalist level, and will be announced in February. National Merit Scholarship winners will be announced April through July of 2017.

Information courtesy of Naperville School District 203 and Indian Prairie School District 204.

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