New Lenox Senior Earns National Merit Scholarship

NEW LENOX, IL — On Wednesday, the National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced over 3,100 winners of National Merit Scholarships between $500 and $2,000, financed by U.S. colleges and universities. The winners include one high school senior from New Lenox.

Alyssa Barta, from Lincoln-Way West High School, earned a National Merit University of Arizona scholarship. Barta has a probable career field in education.

The National Merit winners announced this week will have their scholarships funded by the colleges and universities that they will attend. One hundred and sixty colleges and universities — including 85 private and 75 public schools — took part in the merit scholarship program in 2021.

An additional group of college-sponsored National Merit scholars will be announced in July, the scholarship corporation said. This group is part of the approximately 7,500 National Merit scholarship winners who will be selected by the end of 2021. National Merit scholarships via corporate-sponsored awards and the corporation's own $2,500 scholarships were announced earlier in the spring.

More than 1.5 million juniors nationally entered the 2021 National Merit scholarship program when they took the 2019 preliminary SAT/National Merit scholarship qualifying test, the corporation said. About 17,000 semifinalists, fewer than 1 percent of the country's high school seniors, were announced last fall.

Semifinalists had to write an essay and detail their extracurricular activities, awards and leadership positions to become a finalist. About half of the 16,000 finalists will be merit scholars by the end of the year, the corporation said.