Eighteen PYLUSD Seniors named National Merit Scholarship Semifinalists

The Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District (PYLUSD) is proud to announce that 18 seniors have been identified as Semifinalists in the 2024 National Merit Scholarship Competition! This includes two students from El Dorado High, nine students from Valencia High, and seven students from Yorba Linda High.

On Wednesday, September 13, officials of the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced the names of approximately 16,000 semifinalists in the 69th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,100 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $28 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. About 95 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. 

Nearly 1.3 million juniors in more than 21,000 high schools entered the 2024 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 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 will be announced in spring 2024. These scholarship recipients will join nearly 375,000 other distinguished young people who have earned the Merit Scholar title. Great job, PYLUSD seniors!

El Dorado High School (2)

Gess, Evan

Robinson, Julia C.

Valencia High School (9)

Chao, Jessica T.

Kim, Kangsan A.

Lee, Nathan H.

Ma, Alicia K.

McCathern, Asher S.

Park, Joseph J.

Vidhun, Tanya J.

Wong, Alyssa G.

Youm, Dong H.

Yorba Linda High School (7)

Bulis, Noelle L.

Chi, Leonardo T.

Lee, Abigail S.

Leong, Justin

Rezk, Kareem

Wu, Kaitlyn S.

Yang, Ethan W.


To see a full list of local semifinalists courtesy of the Orange County Register, visit https://www.ocregister.com/2023/09/13/these-orange-county-high-schoolers-are-national-merit-semifinalists-for-2024/.

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