Andrew Ku Wins National Merit Scholarship
The honors just keep rolling in for Huntington High School senior Andrew Ku. The teenager has earned a $2,500 National Merit scholarship, making him one of just 2,500 recipients chosen from a talent pool of more than 15,000 finalists across the country.
Mr. Ku plans to attend Vassar College in the fall. "I'm not yet sure about a major," he said. "I want to take different classes in the first year and then decide." One possibility is a major in biochemistry.
"Andrew's National Merit scholarship is yet another outstanding achievement to add to his list of ongoing and impressive accomplishments," Huntington Superintendent James W. Polansky said.
Mr. Ku and his fellow scholarship recipients were "state judged to have the strongest combination of accomplishments, skills, and potential for success in rigorous college studies," according to the National Merit Scholarship Corp.
This year's competition for National Merit scholarships began in October 2010 when approximately 1.5 million juniors in some 22,000 high schools took the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. Last fall, the highest-scoring participants in each state, representing less than one percent of the nation's high school seniors, were named semi-finalists on a state representational basis. Only these 16,000 semi-finalists had an opportunity to continue in the competition.