Albuquerque Public Schools: Congrats To Our National Merit Scholarship Semifinalists!

Press release from Albuquerque Public Schools:

September 15, 2021

Thirty-two Albuquerque Public Schools high school seniors have been named semifinalists in the 2022 National Merit Scholarship Program. They are among 16,000 students from across the nation competing for $30 million in scholarships.

To qualify as a semifinalist, students earned top scores on the 2020 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. Millions of students in tens of thousands of high schools take the exam each year. The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than 1 percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.

"To be recognized as a National Merit Semifinalist is a huge honor for students because it represents years of hard work and dedication to learning," said APS Superintendent Scott Elder. "Congratulations to this bright group of students. We are proud of your accomplishment and expect great things from you in the future."

• Alexander S. Maynes-Pointon
• Malcolm Parnall
• Kayla A. Perce
• Anastasia Smith

• Zoey Michel E. Adams
• Alyssa L. Cunningham 

• Pierce O. Christison
• Savannah L. Davidson

• Adam G Oliphant 
• Ainsley A. Paas
• Joseph R. Watson

• Pascal R. Andreas
• Rahul Chalamala
• Milidu N.Jayaweera
• Francesca B. Jones
• Andrew Kim
• Prashamsa Koirala
• Oliver L. Kuang
• Elan Z. Landau
• Henry Li
• Derrick T. Niu
• Yana A. Outkin
• Hanan J. Soicher
• Mario F. Sumali
• Emilia Vignogna-Browne
• Benjamin A. Willhite
• Janie Xiong
• Jenny Xiong
• Melody F. Yeh 
• Brandon Yoo

• Mason C. Parrish

• Annette I. Miller 

From the approximately 16,000 semifinalists, about 15,000 are expected to advance to the finalist level, and in the spring they will be notified of this designation. All National Merit Scholarship winners will be selected from this group of finalists. Merit Scholar designees are selected based on their skills, accomplishments, and potential for success in rigorous college studies, without regard to gender, race, ethnic origin, or religious preference.

Those students will compete for one of three merit scholarships:

• $2,500 National Merit Scholarship (2,500 awarded nationally)
• Corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship Award (about 1,000 awarded by about 220 corporations and businesses nationally)
• College-sponsored Merit Scholarship (about 4,100 awarded by about 180 colleges and universities).

This press release was produced by Albuquerque Public Schools. The views expressed here are the author’s own.