UPPER ST. CLAIR, PA — Two Upper St. Clair High School seniors are among the first round of winners in the 2025 National Merit Scholarship program.
About 830 high school seniors in the U.S. won the corporate-sponsored scholarships, providing annual awards between $1,000 and $10,0000. Most of the scholarships are renewable for four years of undergraduate study, but some awards are single payments between $2,500 and $5,000.
Winners may use the scholarships at a regionally accredited college and university in the U.S. Students who were National Merit Scholarship finalists were chosen by corporations because they are children of employees, are residents of communities they serve or plan to pursue college majors or careers the company wants to support.
There were two winners from Upper St. Clair in the first round of scholarships: Shriya V. Narasimhan received the National Merit Eaton Scholarship and plans to study mechanical engineering. Sophia Whitman won the National Merit Federal Express Corporation Scholarship and plans to study writing.
Students were entered into the 2025 National Merit Scholarship competition by taking the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test as juniors. There were more than 16,000 semifinalists chosen from the highest-scoring students, representing less than 1 percent of American high school seniors.
To be considered for finalist status, semifinalists had to complete a scholarship application with an essay and information about extracurricular activities, awards, and leadership positions, have an outstanding academic record, receive recommendation from a school official and earn SAT scores confirming their PSAT performance. About 15,000 semifinalists advanced to finalist status.
About 6,930 finalists will win National Merit Scholarships totaling almost $26 million in 2025. According to the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, “Winners are the Finalist candidates judged to have the strongest combination of academic skills and achievements, extracurricular accomplishments, and potential for success in rigorous college studies.”
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation will announce winners of its own National Merit $2,500 Scholarships on May 7, and college-sponsored scholarship winners will be announced on June 4 and July 14.
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
