Bellaire students named semifinalists for National Merit Scholarship

Bellaire and Episcopal high schools recently released the names of students who have qualified as semifinalists in the 2013 National Merit Scholarship Program.

The students are some of approximately 16,000 semifinalists in the 58th annual program and will now have the opportunity to advance to the final round, competing for one of 8,300 National Merit Scholarships to be awarded in spring 2013.

Semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the level of finalist. Approximately 90 percent of students are expected to attain the standing, with more than half winning a scholarship.

The Preliminary SAT and National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test serves as the initial screening, which current semifinalists took in 2011 as high school juniors.

The semifinalists represent less than 1 percent of high school seniors in the United States and are the highest-scoring entrants in the state.

Semifinalists from Bellaire High School are: Andrew M. Alter, Lindsey D. Alter, Halla Bearden, Christian M. Breitbeil, Kevin Chen, Blaine A. Cole, Andrei V. Didenko, Xinghau Dou, Molly G. Dyer, Peter O. Elmers, Katherine Fang, Alexander Franshaw, Garland R. Gay, Anneliese M. Gest, Sarah K. Godwin, Carrie X. Jiang, Vivek Kantamani, Zara Kahn, Joseph C. Lau, Kirby J. Ledvina, Benjamin Liu, Jaqueline H. Luo, Aaron J. Mao, Helen S. Mazella, Alexander L. Mo, Adarsh Nednur, Willis Nguy, Amanda K. Pevehouse, Holly S. Reichert, Diana T. Ruan, Yulan L. Shih, Jun Ling Tao and Edward D. Yun.

Semifinalists from Episcopal High School are: Joanna M. Lefebvre, Timothy J. McMahon and Abigail M. Porter.