WESTPORT, CT — The National Merit Scholarship Corporation Monday announced over 800 additional winners of National Merit Scholarships financed by colleges and universities, and one of the recipients is a Staples High School student.
Receiving the four-year, annual award of between $500 and $2,000 is Westport resident Dania A. Hemdan, who will attend Boston University in the fall to study Medicine, according to NMSC. Hemdan joins more than 2,900 Merit Scholar designees who also received college-sponsored awards last month.
“Officials of each sponsor college selected their scholarship winners from among the Finalists in the National Merit Scholarship Program, who will attend their institution,” merit scholarship officials wrote in a statement.
A total of 149 colleges and universities are sponsoring approximately 3,700 Merit Scholarship awards, which includes 77 private and 72 public institutions located in 42 states and the District of Columbia.
“This final group of winners brings the number of 2024 National Merit Scholars to more than 6,900,” officials said. “These distinguished high school graduates will receive scholarships for undergraduate study worth a total of nearly $26 million.”
In May, three Westport students were named National Merit $2500 Scholarship winners.
From the National Merit Scholarship announcement:
This year’s competition for National Merit Scholarships began when high school juniors took the 2022 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. In September 2023, more than 16,000 Semifinalists were named on a state-representational basis in numbers proportional to each state’s percentage of the national total of graduating high school seniors. Semifinalists were the highest-scoring program entrants in each state and represented less than one percent of the nation’s seniors.
To become a Finalist, each Semifinalist had to complete a detailed scholarship application, which included writing an essay, describing leadership positions and contributions in school and community activities, showing an outstanding academic record, and being endorsed and recommended by a high school official. Semifinalists also had to take the SAT® or ACT® and earn scores that confirmed their performance on the initial qualifying test. From the Semifinalist group, over 15,000 attained Finalist standing, and about half of the Finalists were chosen to receive National Merit Scholarships.
NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was founded in 1955 to conduct the National Merit Scholarship Program. Over the past 69 years, approximately 382,000 outstanding young individuals have won National Merit Scholarships worth more than $1.3 billion. The majority of awards offered each year are underwritten by approximately 320 independent corporate and college sponsors that support NMSC’s efforts to recognize scholastically talented youth and encourage the pursuit of academic excellence.
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