Photo courtesy of Karen Svetlay.
Mountain Brook High School’s National Merit semifinalists include, first row (L-R): Lily Plowden, Virginia Cobbs, Jane Margaret Turner, Mabry Smyer; second row (L-R): Ben Harris, Ella Grace Bowers, Lil Balogh, Chloe Kinderman, Amy Taliaferro, Lewis Fischer; third row (L-R): Key Foster, Tate Record, Reaves Gardner, Edward Berry, John Butrus, Connor Bowen; fourth row (L-R): Pavel Shirley, Mark Waller, Alex Bebenek, Stephen Malone, Samuel Cox.
Twenty-one Mountain Brook High School students have been named National Merit semifinalists. They are among 16,000 semifinalists in the 65th 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 $31 million that will be offered next spring.
The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than 1% of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.
Mountain Brook’s semifinalists include:
- Lil Balogh
- Alex Bebenek
- Edward Berry
- Connor Bowen
- Ella Grace Bowers
- John Butrus
- Virginia Cobbs
- Samuel Cox
- Lewis Fischer
- Key Foster
- Reaves Gardner
- Ben Harris
- Chloe Kinderman
- Stephen Malone
- Lily Plowden
- Tate Record
- Pavel Shirley
- Mabry Smyer
- Amy Taliaferro
- Jane Margaret Turner
- Mark Waller
The National Merit Scholarship Program honors individual students who show exceptional academic ability and potential for success in rigorous college studies. Over 1.5 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools entered the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2018 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.
The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors. To become a finalist, the semifinalist and a high school official must submit a detailed scholarship application in which they provide information about the semifinalist’s academic record, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment and honors and awards received.
A semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay and earn SAT or ACT scores that confirm the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test.
Submitted by National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
