National Merit Program Recognizes 27 Seniors

The National Merit® Scholarship Program has recognized 27 University School seniors as Semifinalists and Commended students in the 2025 competition. These 27 Semifinalists and Commended students represent 25% of the University School Class of 2025. 

These students qualified for this recognition based on their 2023 Preliminary SAT/ National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.

 

The nationwide group of Semifinalists represents less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors. The Semifinalist designation is the first step toward becoming a National Merit Scholarship winner. National Merit Scholar winners are selected based on their skills, accomplishments, and potential for success in rigorous college studies.

 

 

Zain Anwar

Andrew Beck

Shrey Bhavaraju

Theo Dengler

Nicky DiTirro

Ben Hoffman

Vishwum Kapadia

Aidan Krishnaney

Kingsten Lin

Daniel Lust

Phineas Quigley

Mark Scheeringa

Aaron Velez

 

The National Merit Scholarship Corporation has also recognized the outstanding academic promise of the following 2025 Commended Students for their high scores on the PSAT: 

 

Zaid Ashruf
Connor Barragate
Nate Bennett
Michael McNally
Nate Miller
Sujay Nalla
Rey Pardeshi
Brad Perry
Danny Pikovskiy
Niklas Rietsch
Gavin Sheppard
Will Stephans
Peter Watkins
Stephen Weinberger

 

Congratulations to these seniors on this outstanding achievement!

 

 

Over 1.3 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools entered the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of Semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.