McLean Students Win National Merit Scholarships In 2022

MCLEAN, VA — Various students who live in McLean or attend McLean schools are among the winners of the National Merit $2,500 Scholarship announced Wednesday.

The 2,500 winners will receive the National Merit Scholarship Corporation's own $2,500 awards. Winners were chosen from 15,000 finalists based on "the strongest combination of accomplishments, skills, and potential for success in rigorous college studies," according to a National Merit Scholarship news release. Each state's amount of winners were chosen based on its percentage of graduating high school seniors in the U.S.

The corporation finances most of these single-payment scholarships, corporations and company foundations that sponsor other scholarships help underwrite the $2,500 in exchange for paying no administrative fees. Winners may use the scholarship at any regionally accredited college or university.

Winners from McLean include:

• Sophie Poellnitz of Arlington, BASIS Independent McLean, plans to study economics
• Joyce Qi of Falls Church, McLean High School, plans to study materials engineering
• Cathy R. Zhang of Falls Church, McLean High School, plans to study law
• William Wallace-Gomez Orr of Great Falls, Langley High School, plans to study writing
• Justin Chen of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study business
• Benjamin Jaepil Choi of McLean, The Potomac School, plans to study entrepreneurship
• Jack Hunter Deutsch of McLean, McLean High School, plans to study economics
• Alyssa Gorbaneva of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study computer science
• Leon Jia of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study computer science
• Erika W. Li of McLean, Langley High School, plans to study biology
• Valerie Li of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study computer science
• Isaac Lin of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study computer science
• Songhan Pang of McLean, McLean High School, plans to study medicine
• Megan Yu of McLean, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, plans to study computer science
• Cynthia Ma of Vienna, McLean High School, undecided for studies

The 2022 National Merit Scholarship Program started in October 2020 when juniors took the PSAT. In fall 2021, the highest-scoring students in each state were named semifinalists, representing less than 1 percent of high school seniors in the U.S.

From over 16,000 semifinalists, over 15,000 students met the high academic standards and other requirements to become finalists. Finalists had to submit applications to apply for the scholarships. For the $2,500 National Merit Scholarship, a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors chose the winners based on finalists' academic record, difficulty level of subjects studied, grades earned, Preliminary SAT scores, contributions and leadership in school and community activities, an essay, and recommendation by a high school official.

This is the second announcement of National Merit Scholarship winners. The first round of winners included 1,000 students who won corporate-sponsored awards on April 27. About 4,000 college-sponsored scholarship winners will be named on June 1 and July 11. In all, about 7,500 students will win nearly $28 million in National Merit Scholarships in 2022.