Souhegan Seniors Named National Merit Semi-Finalists

Souhegan High School has announced seniors Alessandro Mendola and Lauren Ostrowski were named National Merit Semifinalists in the National Merit Scholarship Program.

As semifinalists, Mendola and Ostrowski rank among the top 1 percent of students who entered the 2014 National Merit Scholarship Program. They each have an opportunity earn one of 8,000 National Merit Scholarships, worth more than $35 million. 

According to a press release on the Souhegan High School website, about 1.5 million juniors from 22,000 high schools across the country entered the 2014 National Merit Scholarship Program simply by taking the 2012 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. The nationwide pool of semifinalists includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.

To become a finalist, a semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by the high school principal, and earn SAT scores similar to the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test. The semifinalist and a high school official must submit a detailed scholarship application, which includes the student’s essay and information about the semifinalist’s participation and leadership in school and community activities.