National Merit Scholarship announced the five South Asian students as National Merit Scholarship winners for 2016. 

The 2,500 Merit Scholar designees were chosen from a talent pool of more than 15,000 outstanding Finalists in the 2016 National Merit Scholarship Program. National Merit $2500 Scholarship winners are the Finalists in each state judged to have the strongest combination of accomplishments, skills, and potential for success in rigorous college studies. The number of winners named in each state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the nation’s graduating high school seniors.

Green Valley High –  Aakansha Singh – Probable career field: Medicine

ATech – Sarina Dass – Probable career field: Public Policy (Education Reform)

Clark High – Michelle Malwane – Probable career field: Medicine

Meadows School – Shalini Shah – Probable career field: Medicine and Sonia Vohra – Probable career field: Science/Research

This year’s competition for National Merit Scholarships began in October 2014 when over 1.5 million juniors in some 22,000 high schools took the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. Last fall, the highest-scoring participants in each state, representing less than one percent of the nation’s high school seniors, were named Semifinalists on a state-representational basis.

Only these 16,000 Semifinalists had an opportunity to continue in the competition. From the Semifinalist group, 15,000 students met the very high academic standards and other requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. By the conclusion of the 2016 program, about 7,500 Finalists will have earned the “Merit Scholar” title and received a total of about $33 million in college scholarships.