3 Malvern Area High Schools Had Students Make List Of National Merit Semifinalists

MALVERN, PA — Three Malvern high schools had 20 students in all who were named in September as National Merit Scholarship semifinalists.

Great Valley High School had 16 semifinalists named. Malvern Preparatory School had three, and Villa Maria Academy had one semifinalist named to the list.

The semifinalist list comes after high school juniors enter the 2022 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2020 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT). The nationwide pool of semifinalists represents less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors and 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. A semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and earn SAT® or ACT® scores that confirm the student's earlier performance on the qualifying test.

From the approximately 16,000 semifinalists, about 15,000 are expected to advance to the finalist level, and in February they will be notified of this designation. All National Merit Scholarship winners will be selected from this group of finalists. Merit Scholar designees are selected on the basis of their skills, accomplishments, and potential for success in rigorous college studies, without regard to gender, race, ethnic origin, or religious preference.

The students who are National Merit Scholarship semifinalists, by their high schools are:

Great Valley High School
Charlotte C. Borger
Benjamin S. Dai
Matthew M. Discepola
Louise S. Dupont
Eric J. Han
Jay S. Jagani
Brennan M. James
Riya A. Kinny
Anish Kodali
Divya R. Kothakapa
Leon J. Li
Bo Sun
Katrina Marie L. Verano
Justenn Wang
Ally H. Wen
Phillip Zhang

Malvern Preparatory School
Cole P. Cherian
Nolan J. Horan
Sumant Sharma

Villa Maria Academy
Julia R. Young

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