GERMANTOWN, Tenn. — Sixteen Houston High School seniors are National Merit semifinalists.
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced Wednesday the names of its semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program.
Houston High School's semifinalists:
Arshad, Suha
Bhatara, Vaidehi
Byers, Cooper
Conard, Raquel
Desurkar, Pradnya
Desurkar, Pranav
Frankel, Elliott
Garde, Avani
Gardner, Angela
Harreld, Madeline
Kamin, Robert
Kasibhatla, Geetha
Li, Zhuoyuan (Alex)
Pande, Harsawardhan (Harshu)
Saksena, Saksham
Sinojia, Parth
These talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $31 million that will be offered next spring.
The nationwide pool of applicants is about 1.5 million, and the semifinalists represent less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors.
This is the largest number of semifinalists that GMSD has ever had.
"Qualifying to be a National Merit Semifinalist is such a huge honor," said student Avani Garde. "I started prepping for the PSAT the summer before my junior year. I worked practice problems about 3 hours per week, so it's really rewarding to see the payoff. It goes to show that putting in extra work helps you out in the end. National Merit Semifinalists automatically receive scholarships at many schools, so that one test can go a long way in paying for education," continued Garde.
"I feel honored to join the fine cut of my peer group, which opens various avenues for my future education including access to merit scholarships. This award is gratifying recognition of my efforts and hard work put in during high school years," echoed fellow National Merit Semifinalist Saksham Saksena.
"Germantown School District is proud of the fact that we have sixteen students who qualified for National Merit Semifinalists this year. This is an exciting accomplishment for our students, but we are also proud of the fact this represents years of excellent education for these students. All of our educators and these students' families should be proud of the investments that they have made in these exceptional scholars," said Superintendent Jason Manuel.
