Today the National Merit Scholarship Corporation named six Weston High School students and one Rivers student as 2023 National Merit Scholarship Semi-Finalists. They are among 16,000 nationwide semi-finalists in the 68th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to
continue in the competition for some 7,250 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $28 million that will be offered next spring.

High school juniors entered the 2023 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2021 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semi-finalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of Semi-finalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.

To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, semi-finalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. About 95 percent of the Semi-finalists are expected to attain Finalist standing, and approximately half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar® title. Finalists will be named between April and July and are eligible for a number of scholarships.

The Weston HS students are Ian Chang, Merrill Chiang, Roy Huang, Richard Li, Derek Moeller, and Daniel Zhu . Go ‘cats!

Congratulations to Rivers student Katherine Sopko. Go Red-Winged Blackbirds!

NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was established in 1955 specifically to conduct the annual National Merit Scholarship Program. Scholarships are underwritten by NMSC with its own funds and by approximately 340 business organizations and higher education institutions that share NMSC’s goals of honoring the nation’s scholastic champions and encouraging the pursuit of academic excellence.