The National Merit Scholarship program recognizes the highest-achieving U.S. seniors. This year, only the top 1.4% of the senior class in Arizona have made it into the semifinals of the competition. In order for a student to enter this competition, they must take the PSAT/NMSQT (Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test) and score around 217/228. The higher score you get correlates to the amount of scholarship opportunity you receive.
The process of winning awards from the program takes time and is a painstaking wait. Students take the test during their junior year, but the scholarship winners won’t be announced until February. Student semifinalist Michael Crum reflected on his experience, “Waiting from PSAT scores to knowing you’re a semifinalist was a long wait.”
The financial aid these scholarships provide can greatly impact the futures of these students. Crum, who plans to attend BYU emphasizes how a scholarship would help him, “The scholarship will help me graduate debt-free.”
Many of the competitors are in a variety of extracurricular activities. Semifinalist Tiffany Nguyen shared, “I’m Senior Class president of STUGO, CO-President of Operation Smile and I’m in a lot of other clubs like NHS, Rho Kappa, and I also do a lot of food banks and carnivals for elementary schools.”. Nguyen illustrates her life outside of her studies and academics, with her support system being her family. Nguyen added, “My family…they help me study and always made sure I was undisturbed when I was working.”
National Merit offers many scholarships, one of which being QuestBridge the scholarship describes itself as, “connecting high-achieving students from low-income backgrounds with a thriving community and transformative educational, career, and life opportunities”(questbridge.org 2024). QuestBridge is a scholarship through National Merit that aids those students who come from low-income families.
Semifinalist Kaylee Messenger highlighted the options available to her, stating, “I have opportunities from QuestBridge, BYU, and many other state schools.” She further explained, “You have to take the PSAT then back it up with an ACT or SAT.”
Being in the National Merit Scholarship Program does not require you to lose your social life or hobbies. Tyler Andersen, another semifinalist, said he does a lot more besides homework and school. He explained, “School is not everything to me, I like doing other things like: sports, hanging out with friends, and church stuff.” Andersen wrestled for four years and also is a member of the National Honors Society (NHS). This showcases the variety of interests these students have as well as their academics.
In 2023 the program awarded 28 million dollars to just over 7,140 student finalists. It is a challenging competition to win, on average, 3.5 million students take the PSAT/NMSQT and only around 15,000 get accepted into the program which is about 0.5%. These students are being National Merit semifinalists showcasing great academic achievement.
