By: Sharon Aron Baron

Out of the 53 Broward County Public School students who were named semifinalists in the prestigious 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program, five were from Parkland and Coral Springs high schools.

The students are among 16,000 semifinalists in the 64th annual National Merit Scholarship Program who have an opportunity to continue in the competition for 7,500 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $31 million that will be offered next spring.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest scoring students in each state taking the 2017 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

Local students named 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program semifinalists

Coral Glades High School

Local Students Named Semifinalists in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program 3

Devin R. Katz

Taravella, J.P. High School

Local Students Named Semifinalists in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program 4

Bowen Wu

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

Local Students Named Semifinalists in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program 5

Joyce Guo

Local Students Named Semifinalists in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program 6

David Y. Wu

Local Students Named Semifinalists in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program 7

Florence Yared

All Broward County Public School students named 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program semifinalists:

College Academy at Broward College
Fiona C. Barry
Sydni E. Dichter
Fiona Lin
Rajudarshan D. Persaud
Sarah N. Shield

Cooper City High School
Christine Kim
Ru Zhen Tsai

Cypress Bay High School
Miles Berger
Madison J. Burns
Teresa M. Castano
Daniel A. Cuenca
Martinus J. Dyrud
Dena Fesharaki
Leah Hale
Alan J. Llewellyn
Viraj A. Maddur
Fernando Sosa
Karaline Xia
Nicolas E. Zarramera
Matthew C. Zhang

Deerfield Beach High School
Shriya H. Patel
Steven W. Phang

Everglades High School
Chloe Choi
Shibani T. Mallik
Mia Miranda

Fort Lauderdale High School
Riley Casson
Cody O. Williams

McArthur High School
David J. Bolivar
Taryn L. Bradley

Miramar High School
Danish Hashim

Nova High School
Carter M. Goldman
Matthew Moy
Nicholas Tsung
Brian E. Zhang

Piper High School
Kayla Giesler

Pompano Beach High School
Colleen Maloney
Rachel L. Raybuck
Megan A. Tirrell
Thabasya Veeramani

West Broward High School
Brook Heyd
Maria Lakdawala
Joshua Lederberger

Western High School
Richard Alvero
Raphael S. Cheng
Hoang C. Le
Dylan R. Ogrodowski
Andrei A. Santos
Isabel A. Wood

To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition. About 90 percent of the semifinalists are expected to attain finalist standing, and about half of the finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.

Author Profile

Sharon Aron Baron

Sharon Aron Baron is a Parkland resident and editor of Talk Media. She has been covering Parkland news since 2012. Parkland Talk was created to provide News, Views, and Entertainment for the residents of Parkland.