The National Merit Scholarship Corporation recently recognized 62 IUSD students as semifinalists in its prestigious scholarship program, the highest number of qualifiers in the county.
These talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for nearly 6,930 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $26 million that will be offered next spring.
To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition. About 95 percent of the semifinalists are expected to attain finalist standing, and approximately half of the finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.
High school juniors entered the 2026 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2024 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.
To become a Finalist, the Semifinalist and a high school official must submit a detailed scholarship application, in which they provide information about the Semifinalist’s academic record, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment, and honors and awards received. A Semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and earn SAT® or ACT® scores that confirm the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test.
To learn more about the National Merit Scholarship program, visit .
IUSD’s National Merit Semifinalists
Irvine High School
Chen, Audrey
Coffin, Lennon H.
Joshi, Shivani
Mittal, Dev B.
Rout, Annika
Vaidhyanathan, Sriram S.
Northwood High School
Chew, Lauryn
Chu, Jordan
Delsman, Cooper N.
Jung, Howard J.
Kim, Susan
Park, Bijou Y.
Ramkumar, Pragnya
Rana, Usman
Roh, Elliott H.
Tiong, Raelle
Wen, Michael X.
Xie, Kevin
Ye, Nicole T.
Yu, Sean S.
Portola High School
Aia, Adithi A.
Akalin, Peri
Kang, Hyunsoo
Kim, Tyler
Lee, Mary J.
Liang, William Y.
Liu, Claire C.
Muvvala, Suhrith S.
Mye, Brennon
Pillai, Keerthana
Samiullah, Alina
Sheng, Chenpeng
Sun, Yangming
Tang, Alana R.
Urianton, Chloe C.
Yeh, Shan-Yu
Zheng, Mylyn
Zhou, Kerry
University High School
Chan, Connor
Chen, Leah K.
Cheng, Claudia
Huang, Zixi
Jiang, Xiao
Liu, Brianna
Liu, Lawrence B.
Menaker, Mark
Nam, Daniel S.
Schulman, Coby S.
Valdevit, Luca G.
Wu, Justin L.
Yan, Angelina M.
Yevtushenko, Feodor A.
Zhao, Linjie
Woodbridge High School
Chen, Shandi
Huang, Marissa
Joshi, Shashwat
Kao, Andrew J.
Miller, Alexander X.
Noh, Yuna J.
Ramadass, Saravanavasan
Robbins, Henry
Suh, Dylan P.