El Cerrito Student Wins College-Sponsored National Merit Scholarship

EL CERRITO, CA — An El Cerrito student was awarded a National Merit Scholarship Monday, joining 1,200 students around the country honored for high test scores, good grades, and meaningful extracurricular involvement.

The most recent batch of scholarships were sponsored by 155 colleges and universities spread across 42 states and the District of Columbia. The winners of these awards will receive between $500 and $2,000 annually for up to four years of undergraduate study at the sponsoring institution.

Since the fall of 2021, the National Merit Scholarship Corporation has also announced winners sponsored by corporations and the National Merit Scholarship Committee. In total, 7,200 finalists have been awarded a total of nearly $28 million in scholarships.

In El Cerrito, Zachary A. Chin received a scholarship from Northeastern University in Boston. His probable career field is Business Management. Chin graduated from El Cerrito High School.

Finalists are initially selected based on 2020 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test scores. The 16,000 highest scorers across the country were invited to complete a detailed application that included writing an essay, obtaining a recommendation from a high school official, and submitting an academic transcript and list of extracurricular activities. Semifinalists also had to achieve qualifying scores on the SAT or ACT exams to be named as finalists.

Since 1955, the National Merit Scholarship has awarded roughly $1.3 billion in aid to 368,000 high school students.