High schools in and around Naperville are full of talent — so much so that 85 students from six area schools have been named semifinalists in the National Merit Scholarship Program.
These high-achieving students showed academic promise when they took the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test last fall. Now, the nonprofit National Merit Scholarship Corporation has named them among 16,000 semifinalists chosen from the highest-scoring students in the nation.
Here’s a look at who has made it to the semifinalist level, described as the “highest-scoring entrants in each state,” in this year’s scholarship competition from high schools in Naperville Community School District 203, Indian Prairie School District 204 and Benet Academy.
Dist. 203: 29 semifinalists
School board members recognized 14 National Merit Scholarship semifinalists from Naperville Central during Monday’s meeting. The district plans to laud 15 semifinalists who attend Naperville North High School during the board meeting on Oct. 7.
Naperville Central High School: 14 semifinalists
- Anay A. Apte
- Brian Dai
- Zaid S. Hasan
- Rohan Jha
- Isaac T. Kalathiveetil
- Helen H. Liang
- Michael C. Liu
- Shawn J. Plackiyil
- Aryan Pradhan
- Joseph A. Schnack
- Iris E. Shadis-Greengas
- William X. Wang
- Arthur Z. Xu
- Qinyue Zhang
Naperville North High School: 15 semifinalists
- Elin A. Amundson
- Soren A. Casey
- Mika K. Chang
- Chloe S. Chen
- Rhea N. Ganpule
- Joshua D. Jamrosz
- Yilin Liu
- Anika P. Lovisa
- Bridget A. Ogan
- Rudra P. Pandya
- Aanika M. Parekh
- Sarah K. Riemer
- Owen G. Woker
- Sophia R. Xi
- Benjamin J. Zhang
Dist. 204: 50 semifinalists
School board members gave a “board salute” during Monday’s meeting to 50 students from the district’s three high schools for their status as National Merit Scholarship semifinalists. Of the recognized students, 13 attend Metea Valley High School, 22 go to Neuqua Valley High School and 15 attend Waubonsie Valley High School.
Metea Valley High School: 13 semifinalists
- Morwena A. Campbell
- Joanna Chu
- Amogh Garde
- Moneesha Goduguchinta
- George J. Karellas
- Ajay T. Kavuri
- Jacob H. Lee
- Neal N. Mohan
- Samarth Mohan
- Tanmay D. Parekh
- Sanchit S. Sidhu
- Kavya N. Suravajhela
- Yuyao Wang
Neuqua Valley High School: 22 semifinalists
- Isaac L. Chang
- Zachary G. Druce-Hoffman
- Maaz H. Farooqui
- Clay G. Kabbe
- Sriya Konchada
- Alice R. Meng
- Varsha R. Nair
- Krithika Nekkanti
- Joseph Ngo
- Nevin M. Philip
- Kavita A. Rajan
- Aditya Rakshit
- Monish Ramesh Jayakumar
- Arnav S. Sheth
- Armaan Sidhu
- Meiling Sun
- Andrew Z. Wan
- Sophia S. Wang
- Luke Wiles
- Evan Yang
- Crystal Y. Yu
- Alexander Zhao
Waubonsie Valley High School: 15 semifinalists
- Ishaan Aggarwal
- Vallabh Arun
- Mannsha N. Assudani
- Vikrant S. Avineni
- Frank S. Chen
- Alois Janssen I. Dilang
- Krishna Jaganathan
- Saye Vikram Karthikeyan
- Yagnesh Lokesh
- Ryan J. Mitchell
- Anirban Mukherjee
- Vikram J. Narasimhan
- Akshath Sivachidhambaram
- Sakti Subramanian
- Anika Sri G. Telu
Benet Academy:
Benet Academy in Lisle celebrated its six National Merit Scholarship semifinalists in a social media post on Monday. “Congratulations on such an incredible achievement!” the post said, as it recognized the following students:
- John Augustyn
- William Jimenez
- Jacob Olejnik
- Laura O’Neill
- Sakti Subramanian
- Liliana Tallitsch
National Merit next steps
Semifinalists now have the opportunity to provide additional application materials to see if they can advance in the competition. Those who continue will seek one of 6,870 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $26 million to be given out in the spring.
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation then will select 15,000 finalists before naming the 6,870 winners chosen for their academic skills, accomplishments and potential for achievement in rigorous collegiate pursuits.
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