At ‘Iolani 36 members of the Class of ’09 qualified as National Merit Scholarship semi-finalists for 2009.

          These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 8,200 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $35 million, that will be offered next spring.

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

          More than 1.5 million juniors in over 21,000 high schools entered the 2009 National Merit Program by taking the 2007 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of semi-finalists, which represents less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest scoring entrants in each state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.

          ‘Iolani’s 36 semi-finalists for 2009 include the following who were juniors in 2007-08:

Kristelle K. Aisaka

Keiko A. Akamine

Shantel H. Asada

Nikki A. Castel

Bhasha Chakrabarti

Kai Y. Chen

Kevin J. Duong

Joseph T. Durso

Alexa J. Hettwer

Lianne T. Ho

Julia Bree M. Horie

Grant Iwamoto

Jueun Jang

Amy M. Ko

Jeffery T. Kwock

Quingyun Liao

Amelia K. Linsky

David M. Martorana

Jackelyn A. McMillan

Celia Y. Ou

Zoe M. Petticord

Jeffrey T. Sakamoto

Jessica S. Saylors

Zachary P Simao

Robert J. Tamai

Kevin T. Tanaka

Eve Y. Tang

Samantha Tasaki

Elysse S. Tom

Uyanga Tsedev

Lauren E. Walker

Danielle M. Wilson

Emily K. Yamamura

Sean J. Yancey

Craig M. Yugawa

Julia A. Zhang