Darien High School Students Awarded National Merit Scholarships

DARIEN, CT — Two Darien High School students have been awarded a $2,500 National Merit Scholarship.

According to a news release, the 2,500 Merit Scholar designees across the country were chosen from a talent pool of some 16,000 outstanding finalists in the 2021 National Merit Scholarship Program.

Darien High School students Veda Malhotra and Natalie K. Volz have been awarded $2,500 scholarships. Both students' probable career field is medicine.

Scholars were selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors, who appraised a substantial amount of information submitted by both the finalists and their high schools: the academic record, including difficulty level of subjects studied and grades earned, scores from the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, contributions and leadership in school and community activities, an essay written by the finalist and a recommendation written by a high school official.

This year's National Merit Scholarship Program began in October 2019 when over 1.5 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools took the PSAT/NMSQT, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

Last fall, the highest-scoring participants in each state, representing less than one percent of the nation’s high school seniors, were named semifinalists on a state-representational basis. Only these approximately 17,000 semifinalists had an opportunity to continue in the competition.

From the semifinalist group, some 16,000 students met the very high academic standards and other requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition.

By the conclusion of the 2021 program, about 7,500 finalists will have earned the "Merit Scholar" title and received a total of nearly $30 million in college scholarships.