Apple Valley, Eastview Students Named National Merit Semifinalists

One and 10 students have been named National Merit Semifinalists along with nearly 16,000 other students nationwide, according to a news release from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation. They are:

• Apple Valley High School senior Maren Loe

• Eastview High School seniors Reid Anderson, Mikyla Carpenter, Lamisa Chowdhury, Nicholas Havlicek, Jane Kagan, Zane Larwood, Nitin Prasad, Andrew Solfest, Mariel Supina, Samantha Zarate

Later during the school year, the pool will be narrowed to finalists, and then to scholarship winners.

About 15,000 semifinalists become finalists, and then 8,300 are expected to receive either a corporate-sponsored scholarship, a college-sponsored scholarship or a $2,500 National Merit scholarship, according to the release.

The first scholarship winners will be announced in April, continuing through July.

Students achieve semifinalist status based on their preliminary SAT, or PSAT, scores. Finalists must have outstanding academic performance and SAT scores and recommendation from their high school principal, and must submit an application with an essay.

The NMSC nonprofit organization began in 1955 specifically to run the scholarship program.