6 Lower Moreland Students Are National Merit Semi-Finalists

LOWER MORELAND, PA — A total of six Lower Moreland High School students have been named semi-finalists for the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program.

The semi-finalists were announced on Wednesday and include approximately 16,000 high-school seniors that will go on to compete for the scholarships that will be offered next spring.

Lower Moreland's semifinalists are listed below:

• Grace E. Devlin
• Gwendolyn T. Duncan
• Nyah P. Jurado
• Michelle I. Nikhinson
• Clayton M. Ostroff
• Aviel Resnick

How are students chosen as National Merit semi-finalists? Students do not actually apply in this first round. All juniors are automatically enrolled when they take the PSATs; a score above 212 earns them National Merit "commended" recognition. That is about 50,000 of the highest-scoring students in the nation.

From there, the semi-finalists are further winnowed down by state, and the number per state is in proportion to a state's population.

Over 90 percent of the semi-finalists will be named as finalists for the scholarship. Of those finalists, about half will win a scholarship.

Students will find out in February whether they make it to the finalist stage. The scholarship winners will be announced beginning in April 2020.