Arora, Collins and Kurak are National Merit Semifinalists

Three Avon Lake High School Seniors have been named National Merit Semifinalists and 11 as Commended Students.

ALHS guidance counselor Mike Kaminski said the 14 students represent the largest total number of students ever at the high school.

Devin Arora, Zachary Collins and Rachel Kurak have been named semifinalists.

Additionally eleven students were recognized as Commended Students in the 2014 National Merit Scholarship Program. They are: Grant Davis, Matthew Forte, Molly Laska, Adam Litzler, Nicholas Maxwell, Kathryn Petroff, Caroline Popiel, Jonathan Shabab, Riley Thomas, Sean Umek and Timothy Villari.

Selection process

Approximately 1.5 million juniors in more than 22,000 high schools entered the 2013 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2011 Preliminary SAT, or PSAT.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest scoring entrants in each state.

To become a finalist, the semifinalist and their high school 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, 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 scores that confirm the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test.

In the National Merit® Scholarship Program, three types of Merit Scholarship® awards are offered to Finalists: National Merit $2500 Scholarships, corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards and college-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards.