The Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District (PYLUSD) is proud to announce that 28 seniors have qualified as Semifinalists in the 2021 National Merit Scholarship Competition! This includes 2 students from El Dorado High School, 18 students from Valencia High School, and 8 students from Yorba Linda High School.
In September, officials of the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced the names of approximately 16,000 Semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $30 million that will be offered next spring. To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, Semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. Over 90 percent of the Semifinalists are expected to attain Finalist standing, and more than half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.
About 1.5 million juniors in more than 21,000 high schools entered the 2021 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2019 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semifinalists, representing less than one percent of high school seniors across the nation, 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.
In September, officials of the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced the names of approximately 16,000 Semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $30 million that will be offered next spring. To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, Semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. Over 90 percent of the Semifinalists are expected to attain Finalist standing, and more than half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.
About 1.5 million juniors in more than 21,000 high schools entered the 2021 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2019 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semifinalists, representing less than one percent of high school seniors across the nation, 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.
National Merit Scholarship winners of 2021 will be announced in four nationwide news releases beginning in April and concluding in July. These scholarship recipients will join more than 353,000 other distinguished young people who have earned the Merit Scholar title.
Great job, PYLUSD seniors!
Great job, PYLUSD seniors!
El Dorado High School NMSC Semifinalists (2)
- Samuel Cimbora
- James Surjadinata
Valencia High School NMSC Semifinalists (18)
- Douglas Chen
- Caroline Ives
- Yunseo Lee
- Audrey Leung
- Alan Luong
- Aqil Naeem
- Donovan Nguyen
- Justin Oh
- Lauren Owen
- Catherine Park
- Aarav Patel
- Kamron Popal
- Woo Hyun Song
- Rohith Venkatesh
- Victor Wen
- Brendan Wong
- Junhyeok Yang
- Elliot Yoon
Yorba Linda High School NMSC Semifinalists (8)
- Soham Bhagat
- Audrey Lee
- Ishaan Sakhrani
- Elijah Seo
- Dylan Shih
- Rohita Thammineni
- Yiran Wang
- Christina Yangsheng
