18 Freehold Students Competing For National Scholarships

FREEHOLD, NJ — 18 students from Freehold High School and Biotechnology High School were named among 16,000 semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program, the National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced this week.

The young scholars are now under consideration for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $30 million to be offered next spring.

Their names are:

Biotechnology High School

• Abbud, Grace A.
• Arend, Brooke
• Chen, Phoebe
• Chin, Gabriella
• Dalfonzo, Sophia R.
• Giglio, Alexis
• Kedharnath, Shruti
• Khurana, Eeshan
• Lahoti, Gauri A.
• Lee, Joyce S.
• Malhotra, Navya
• Sahni, Aarush
• Salloum, Zain
• Sannidhi, Pranita
• Wadhwa, Rohan
• Yan, Sydney
• Zhang, Annie Y.

Freehold High School

• Patel, Shivam

More than 1.5 million high school juniors across the country took the 2019 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, with highest scoring test takers from each state making it to the semifinals.

The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state's percentage of the national total of graduating seniors, according to the organization.

To qualify for the final round, each student and a school official must fill out an application that provides up-to-date information about the semifinalist's academics, in-school participation, community activities, leadership abilities, employment, and awards received.

A semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official and write an essay. The National Merit Scholarship Corporation will release the list of 15,000 finalists in February.

Three types of National Merit Scholarships will be offered in 2021. Each finalist will compete for one of 2,500 National Merit $2,500 Scholarships that will be awarded on a state-representational basis.

About 1,000 corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards will also be provided by approximately 220 corporations for finalists who meet their specified criteria, such as children of the grantor's employees or residents of communities where sponsor offices are based.

Roughly 180 colleges and universities are expected to finance some 4,100 college-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards for finalists who will attend the sponsor institution.

Have a news tip? Email nicole.rosenthal@patch.com.

Click here to get Patch email notifications, or get breaking news alerts sent right to your phone with our app, download here. Follow Freehold Patch on Facebook.