EVANSTON, Ill. — The National Merit Scholarship Corporation has released the names of some of its 62nd annual National Merit Scholarship Program winners.
More than 1,000 distinguished high school seniors have won corporate-sponsored National Merit Scholarship awards financed by about 200 corporations, company foundations, and other business organizations.
Corporate sponsors provide scholarships for finalists in the NMSC competition who are children of their employees, who are residents of communities that the company serves, or who plan to pursue college majors or careers that the sponsor wishes to encourage.
Most of these awards are renewable for up to four years of college undergraduate study and provide annual stipends that range from $500 to $10,000. Some provide a single payment between $2,500 and $5,000. Recipients can use their awards at any regionally accredited U.S. college or university of their choice.
The National Merit ADP Henry Taub Memorial Scholarship goes to Nicholas Russell Nagamoto of Thousand Oaks, a student at Newbury Park High School in Newbury Park. Probable career field: Medicine.
ADP (Automatic Data Processing Inc.), with over $7 billion in revenues and 500,000 clients, is one of the nation’s largest independent computing services. Merit Scholarship awards are funded by the ADP Foundation for the children of ADP employees.
A total of 2,500 National Merit $2,500 Scholarship winners were chosen from a talent pool of more than 15,000 outstanding finalists, and are the finalists in each state judged to have the strongest combination of accomplishments, skills and potential for success in rigorous college studies. The number of winners in each state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the nation’s graduating high school seniors.
These scholars were selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors, who appraised a substantial amount of information submitted by both the finalists and their high schools — the academic record, including difficulty level of subjects studied and grades earned; scores from two standardized tests; contributions and leadership in school and community activities; an essay written by the finalist; and a recommendation written by a high school official.
Winners include Mason M. Sakamoto of Los Angeles, a student at Windward School in Los Angeles. Probable career field: Medicine.
This award is supported by the NMSC’s own funds.
More winners will be announced in June and July. By the conclusion of this year’s competition, about 7,500 academic champions will have won scholarships worth more than $32 million. For more information, visit www.nationalmerit.org.