Nine South Brunswick HS Students Win National Merit Scholarships

SOUTH BRUNSWICK, NJ — Nine South Brunswick High School students won National Merit Scholarships for 2020; the National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced the winners this week.

These local South Brunswick teens were among more than 1.5 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools to enter the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program when they took the 2018 PSATs, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

The group was then narrowed down to 16,000 semifinalists. 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 or ACT scores that confirmed the qualifying test performance.
From the semifinalist group, about half of the finalists were named Merit Scholarship winners in 2020.

Here are the 2020 winners from South Brunswick:

• Malaika G. Alphons, from Dayton, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Chemical Engineering

Was given a National Merit scholarship to attend Rutgers University

• Srihith R. Narahari, from Kendall Park, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Medicine

Was given a National Merit scholarship to attend Florida Atlantic University

• Sreekar S. Vedula, from Monmouth Junction, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Software Engineering

Was given a National Merit scholarship to attend Rutgers

• Franklin Yin, from Monmouth Junction, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Computer Science

Was given a National Merit scholarship to attend Rutgers

• Samarth Taneja, lives in South Brunswick, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Computer Science

Was given a National Merit scholarship to attend Northeastern University

• Rajat V. Peddinti, lives in Dayton, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Computer Science

Received a National Merit scholarship from Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP). Merit Scholarship awards are funded by the ADP Foundation for the children of ADP employees.

• Praveen S. Parthasarathy, lives in Kendall Park, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Medicine

Received a scholarship from Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, Inc.

• Emily Hang, lives in Monmouth Junction, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Biology

Received a scholarship from Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, Inc.

• Allison Wenshan Li, lives in Monmouth Junction, graduated from South Brunswick High School

Probable career field: Mechanical Engineering (Robotics)

Received a scholarship from Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, Inc.

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