The National Merit Scholarship Corporation recently announced the names of more than 16,000 semifinalists in the 72nd annual National Merit Scholarship Program. Among the semifinalists are 11 Ithaca High School seniors:
Abraham (Bram) Elia
Daniella Falk
Ada Iyer
Julia Kleinberg
Moshe (Mookie) Lundgren-Lahav
Lucy Park-Hookway
Anya Ross
Ari Saar
Ruixing (Max) Wang
Imri Wolf
Jingying Xu
Over 1.2 million juniors entered the 2027 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2025 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.
Semifinalists now have the opportunity to continue competing for National Merit Scholarships, worth approximately $24 million. The winners will be announced in the spring.
Congratulations to these outstanding scholars!