West announces 2021 National Merit Semifinalists
Thirty students from West were selected for this honor.
September 15, 2020
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced the names of the approximately 16,000 Semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. Between the three high schools in the district, 39 seniors have earned this honor. In order to be selected, students have to be among the top one percent of students nationwide on the 2019 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.
West High Interim Principal Mitch Gross announced that West High broke the state record with 30 Semifinalists this year.
The following 30 West High seniors have been declared as Semifinalists:
Paras Bassuk
Amol Bhagavathi
Paul Cremer
Timothy Cui
Connor Curtiss
Nathaniel Deyak
Nathan A Gall
Ann D Gao
Brenda Gao
Jenny Y Geng
Tamara Hamzeh
Catherine Hoefer
Mohan Kumar
Jim Li
Amy Liao
Andy Lu
Kevin Lu
Alice Meng
Nina Meng
Dominic Rutkowski
Ananth Shyamal
Divya Shyamal
Matthew Steinbronn
Quincy Tate
Vladimir Tivanski
Niyati Vyas
Alexander Wang
Lucy Westemeyer
Omkar Yadav
Taejune Yoon
These academically gifted students will continue in the competition for $30 million worth of Merit Scholarship awards offered next spring. To be considered, students must advance to the Finalist level of the competition. The Semifinalist and a high school official are required to submit a detailed application, including the student’s academic record, activities, leadership abilities, employment, and honors received.
These seniors must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be recommended by a school official, and write an essay. Around 15,000 of the Semifinalists are expected to advance to the Finalist level, and the winners will be chosen from this group.
National Merit Scholarship winners of 2021 will be announced in four nationwide news releases starting in April and ending in July. These scholarship award recipients will join more than 353,000 other distinguished seniors who have earned the Merit Scholar title.
