5 from Cherry Hill Qualify as National Merit Semifinalists

Four Cherry Hill East seniors and one Cherry Hill West senior are among 16,000 National Merit Scholarship semifinalists nationwide in the 59th year of the program.

Valerie Wilsonall, Kimberly Cardenas, Jay Park, Sarah Sosland and Mahir Sufian qualified from among 1.5 million juniors who took the PSAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test in 2011.

The East seniors will have a chance to at becoming part of the 15,000 finalists in the annual program, which offers about 8,000 Merit Scholarship awards in the spring of 2013, ranging from $2,500 program scholarships to corporate- and university-sponsored scholarships—roughly $35 million in scholarships in total.

To reach that point, a semifinalist has to display an outstanding academic record through his or her four years of high school, be endorsed and recognized by the high school’s principal and earn an SAT score that confirms the student’s performance on the PSAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.