40 seniors recognized as National Merit Semifinalists

Forty seniors were named semifinalists in the 2011 National Merit Scholarship (NMS) Competition today. Additionally, ten seniors were named as semifinalists in the National Achievement Scholarship (NAS) program, a similar competition for black students.

After taking the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT) administered at the end of last October, semifinalists were selected based on their high percentile scores on the test. According to resource counselor Marcia Johnson, each individual state sets its own cutoff for qualifying scores. This year's NMS semifinalists achieved a test score of around 220 or higher, which was the same standard score as the 2010 semifinalists.

In February, the students that are named finalists in the NMS Competition will be awarded $2,500-5,000 in scholarship funding. NAS program finalists will also receive a $2,500 scholarship opportunity.

Out of the 50,000 high school students who take the test each year, approximately 16,000 are named NMS semifinalists. The 16,000 finalists are chosen based off their academic achievement and outstanding extracurricular involvement as noted by their school guidance counselors.

Last year 53 Blazers were recognized as NMS semifinalists and five were named NAS semifinalists. Blair has more 2011 NMS semifinalists than any other high school in Montgomery county.

For more information about the scholarships, visit the NMS web site and the NAS web site.

The National Merit Semifinalists from the class of 2011 are:
Erik V. Agard
Alexander J. Briese
Fang Y. Cao
Savannah L. Cheo
Mario I. Choi
Andrew C. Das Sarma
Jewel Galbraith
Tej V. Ganti
Andrew L. Gibiansky
Casey Goldvale
Hannah C. Ho
Austin Y. Hou
Shelley Jin
Ajay Kannan
Shilpa T. Kannan
Neelnavo Kar
Lev V. Krayzman
Nilay Kumar
Scott R. Lawrence
Rachel D. Leksana
David Z. Liao
Winston W. Liu
Monica T. Ly
Eli M. Okun
Andrew N. Rodgers-Schatz
Natalie E. Rutsch
Sarah E. Schwartz
Thiagarajan Sezhian
Qinlan Shen
Emily Shih
Hakyung Shin
Jennifer K. Sholar
Jonathan B. Song
Ankit Sood
Jed Tan
Aaron D. Tucker
Robert J. Ullman
Sandra C. Yan
Thomas R. Zhang
Xiaoshan Zhang

The National Achievement Semifinalists from the class of 2011 are:
Erik Agard
Brian Clanton
Daniela M
Saleiha Mayer-Marks
Sarah McMillian
Cy Neita
Miles Reinke
Hajaisha Sesay
Aaron Tucker
Selena Wyborski