The College Board honored dozens of local Catholic school students for academic excellence based on their PSAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test scores. Five of them, from two schools, earned further distinction as a National Hispanic Recognition Program Scholar.
Allison Heredia and Alexia Boden, from Notre Dame Preparatory in Scottsdale, along with Marli Dunn, Jennifer Escalante and Margot Luna from Xavier College Preparatory are National Hispanic Recognition Program Scholars. The program identifies academically outstanding Hispanic/Latino high school students. Each year, roughly 5,000 of the highest-scoring students — this year the top two percent — are honored. The award is for recognition purposes only.
Heredia, along with classmate Grant Zaro and dozens of others from local Catholic schools, do have a chance at earning a scholarship as National Merit Semi-Finalists. They represent the top one percent of high school seniors and are among 16,000 nationwide competing for $35 million in scholarships. Half of them, following an extensive application process, will be named finalists and earn scholarships.
The other semifinalists include:
- Xavier College Preparatory — Maha Ahmed, Julia Burke, Andrea Filler, Maeher Grewal, Kelsey Harrison, Emily Hastings, Cecilia Hoang, Marissa Patel, Sarah Sakha, Sophia Wix and Claire Woodrow
- Brophy College Preparatory — Kyle Chapman, Alex Chen, James Crnkovich, Ryan Frankel, Justin Frere, Seth Harris, Justin Hegyi, Will Herold, Aakash Jain, Jeremiah Johnson, George Liddy, Kush Mahajani, Ryan Q. McCoy, Christopher Munhall, Michael Nahom, Jack Park, Cory Pitt, Garrett Rupp, Andrew Salmon, Brian Scaramella, Jack Travis, Samuel Triplett, Raj Vatsa, Nolan Weinstein, Spencer Wix, Matthew Worley
Others were named “Commended Students” by scoring in the top 5 percent of some 1.5 million students who took a PSAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. Those 38 students show academic promise.
Notre Dame: Rachel Blackbourn, Erin Bradford, Allison Heredia, Bridget Maguire, Evelyn Medai, Maya Patel, Mckalya Tully and Grant Zaro
Xavier: Madison Cisiewski, Lauren D’Souza, Erin Fakler, Kathleen Fowler, Sierra Fullmer, Hailey Jensen, Lauren Murphy, Alyssa Nazareno, Elizabeth Overton, Mackenzie Paynter, Sophia Tew, Katherine Welty, Octavia White, and Emily Wusterbarth
Brophy: Jacob Anderson, Max Ashton, Jared Balbona, Jacob Bourgogne, Ben Crozier, Calvin Fairbourn, Rohin Galhotra, Charlie Miller, Nic Miller, Adam Mosharrafa, Ryan Opila, Coby Palivathukal, Jorge Rascon, Benjamin Sacks, Chris Scaramelia, Kayvon Seif-Naraghi, Kayvan Shamsa, Max Waxman, Ryan Zilter
