The National Merit Scholarship Corp. announced a fresh round of honorees this week, and nearly a third of the 45 Minnesota recipients attend three metro-area high schools.
Nearly a third of Minnesota's 2022 National Merit Scholars come from 3 schools
The students each won $2,500 scholarships.
May 12, 2022 at 9:37PM
Five students from both Mounds View and Edina high schools won $2,500 scholarships. Four students from Wayzata High School secured the highly sought award. Other winners came from a variety of schools across the state.
The National Merit scholarship is among the most esteemed scholastic prizes in the country. To qualify for consideration, students must score high on the PSAT and then earn another high score on the SAT or ACT that confirms their performance.
Recipients are chosen by a committee of high school counselors and college admissions officials. That panel rates each entrant's academic record, which includes a survey of their grades and difficulty of their coursework. Finalists are also judged by a personal essay and letter of recommendation from an educator.
The winners announced in this round include:
Grace Everts, Madeline Howard, Karen Lee, Ananth Veluvali and William Walkley from Edina High School.
Gavin Chang, Elisa Guo, Yatharth Sharma, Riley Stern and Johnny Yue from Mounds View High School.
Atharva Gorantiwar, Emily Liu, Shivansh Sharma and Adhvaith Sridhar from Wayzata High School.
Other winners from Minnesota public and charter schools are: Carter Anderson, Blaine High School; Adri Arquin, Central High School in St. Paul; Hans Xu, Century High School in Rochester; Christopher Patz, Chanhassen High School; Campbell Logan, Delano High School; Erik Teder, Eagle Ridge Academy in Minnetonka; Hunter Dunne, Eastview High School in Apple Valley; Akshay Rai, Fridley High School; Kathleen Bacigalupi, Highland Park High School in St. Paul; Jamie Melville, Jefferson High School in Bloomington; Miranda Kubek, Mankato West High School; William Bradley, Mayo High School in Rochester; Ava Chen and Scott Sorensen, Minnetonka High School; Alexander Sell, Rosemount High School; Tehya Sepulvado, Shakopee High School; Fyzeen Ahmad, Tech High School in St. Cloud; Nova Tseng, Orono High School; Claire Heyne, Owatonna High School; and Nikhil Jain, Woodbury High School.
Several National Merit Scholars attend private schools: Dennis Eum, Daria Haner and Skylar Wang, the Blake School in Minneapolis; Katherine Heinsch, Visitation School in Mendota Heights; Ava Krocheski-Meyer, De La Salle High School in Minneapolis; Ruihan Yu, Mounds Park Academy in St. Paul; Matthew Bolton, St. John's Preparatory School in Collegeville; Divya Bhargava, John Hlavka and William Sedo, St. Paul Academy and Summit School; Zachary Chen, Trinity School at River Ridge in Eagan;
The organization will announce two more batches of winners on June 1 and June 11.
These Minnesotans are poised to play prominent roles in state and national politics in the coming years.
