At least 25 Hoover students were named National Merit semifinalists

At least 25 Hoover students were named National Merit semifinalists this year.

That includes 13 from Hoover High, eight from Spain Park High and four from the Alabama School of Fine Arts.

Hoover High's National Merit semifinalists are Elijah Boyd, Alexander Casiday, Henry Chandler, Lily Fu, Krish Gadhia, Akash Gaggar, Mark Houston, Taylor Lynch, Misha Patel, Lauren Rauworth, Tatum Stacey, Daniel Turyk and Isaac Wood.

Spain Park High's semifinalists are Michael Allen, Carmen Britt, Xuyang Chen, Julia Daigle, David Johnson, Tracy Li, Noah Smith and Rebecca Stafford. The Alabama School of Fine Arts had 10 semifinalists, and Hoover's four are Monisha Bommu, Jacob Patton, William Peng and Srihansi Sagi.

These 30 students were among 268 named National Merit semifinalists in Alabama and more than 16,000 selected nationally this year. More than 1.3 million juniors in approximately 21,000 high schools participated in the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as the initial selection of program participants.

The pool of semifinalists, which represents less than 1% of U.S. high school graduates, includes the highest scoring participants in each state, with the number of semifinalists in each state proportional to the state's share of the statewide total number of graduates is upper level.

More than 15,000 students are expected to advance to the finalist stage in February, but only about 6,870 students are expected to receive the National Merit Scholarships, which will be announced in spring 2025.

To become a finalist, semifinalists must submit a detailed scholarship application that includes information about their academic achievements, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership skills, employment, and honors and awards received.

Those selected as finalists must also have excellent academic performance throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and achieve SAT or ACT scores that exceed the previous achievements of the Confirm students in the aptitude test.

Scholars are selected based on their skills, achievements and potential for success in rigorous higher education studies.

Hoover High School also had 13 African American/Black, Hispanic/Latino or Indigenous/Native American students who received National Recognition status by ranking in the top 10% of test takers or a score of 3 or higher in its Alabama honors program earned two or more different AP exams in the ninth and/or tenth grades and a cumulative grade point average of B+ or higher (minimum 3.3 GPA). These students are Fernando Acevedo, Charles Bauer, Jose Bracamontes, Arturo Briseno, Karrington Davis, Ricky Ibarra, Ziyaan Lakhani, Matthew Lam, Caleb Miller, Mia Mojica, Lauren Pate, Jordan Perry and Mardelis Figueroa Ramos.

Spain Park High had three National Recognition Scholars: Sofia Contreras, Trevor Gakunga and Emily Njau.