Nine students earn Nat'l Merit honors Two named to Nat'l program for black Americans

Nat'l Merit Semifinalist
      One semifinalist, Jonathan Karp of South High School, is among the 191 students from Long Island who will now continue in the competition for some 8,000 Merit Scholarships, worth $32 million, to be offered next spring by the National Merit Corporation, 300 business corporations, and about 200 colleges and universities.
      Semifinalists are the highest-scoring students on a state proportional basis and represent less than 1 percent of the approximately 1.3 million students who took the PSAT. To become finalists, they must have a record of very high academic performance, be endorsed by their school, earn Scholastic Aptitude Test scores that confirm their PSAT performance, and submit a detailed scholarship application that includes an essay and information about their participation and leadership in school and community activities. About 90 percent of semifinalists become finalists.

Eight Commended Students
      The eight remaining students, Kyle Antonelli, Amrita Khokhar and Paul Kovalov from Central High School, Edith Jurado and Jacquelyn Cafasso from North High School, and Jordan Epstein, Daniel Kyung and Andrew Lim from South High School, are those who have received National Merit Letters of Commendation. They are among the 34,000 high performers who scored in the top 5 percent nationwide on the PSAT, but do not continue in the competition.
      Said the National Merit Scholarship Corporation: "Recognition of academically talented students and of the key role played by schools in their development is essential to the pursuit of educational excellence in our nation. The young people being named Commended Students have demonstrated outstanding academic potential by their strong performance in this highly competitive program. We hope that this recognition will help broaden their educational opportunities and that they will continue to pursue scholastic excellence and to develop their abilities to the fullest. These young people represent a very valuable national resource."

Nat'l Achievement for Black Americans
      In addition to the nine students named above, two seniors, Jennifer Saint-Preux from Central, and Funmi Ojetayo from North, were among 3,000 outstanding students nationwide to be recognized by the National Achievement Scholarship Program for Black Americans, initiated in 1964. These students scored in the top 5 percent of the more than 120,000 Black Americans who requested consideration in the program. While, like Nat'l Merit Commended Students, they do not continue in the competition, their names are referred to U.S. colleges and universities because of their academic promise.