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Out of the more than 16,000 semifinalists in the 72nd annual National Merit Scholarship Program, 12 are local students.

Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science has 8 semifinalists: Christopher Chen, Amy Choi, Katie Chung, Hutchinson Clemons, Samantha Diamond, Angelina Tan, Khang Tran and Maya Venkat.

From Heritage Academy, Robert Dawson and Thomas Garner are semifinalists, along with Brody Brown from Caledonia High School and Ella Horan from Starkville High School.

The semifinalists were selected from more than 1.2 million juniors across the county who took the 2025 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The pool of semifinalists includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.

To become a finalist, semifinalists and an official from their high school must submit a detailed scholarship application, which includes information about the student’s academic records, participation in school and in the community, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment and awards received. Semifinalists must also have an outstanding academic record throughout high school and write an essay.

More than 15,000 semifinalists are expected to advance to finalist level. All National Merit Scholarship winners will be selected from this group of finalists.

There will be three types of National Merit Scholarships offered in the spring. Finalists will compete for a $2,500 scholarship awarded on a state-representational basis. Finalists who meet specific criteria will compete for about 700 corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards. Additionally, 140 colleges and universities will sponsor about 3,500 Merit Scholarship awards for finalists who attend the sponsor institution.