As announced by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC), 27 Lake Washington School District (LWSD) high school seniors qualified as semifinalists in the 58th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. The students will now complete for 8,400 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $36 million.

A total of 16,000 academically talented high school seniors nationwide have qualified. These students will have the opportunity to continue in the competition for some 8,400 National Merit Scholarships, worth more than $32 million, that will be offered next spring.

Students qualified for these awards by completing the 2011 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of Semifinalists, which represents less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest scoring entrants in each state.

Redmond High School had the highest number of recipients in the district, with 16 students named as semifinalists.

Lake Washington School District National Merit Semifinalists from around Kirkland include:

International Community School, Kirkland: Amanda Collyer of Woodinville, Priya Ganesan of Redmond, Yena Han , Amanda Lin of Redmond, Smrithi Sukumar of Sammamish.

Juanita High School, Kirkland: Gabrielle Hsu.

Lake Washington High School, Kirkland: Katherine Roberts.

Redmond High School, Redmond: Daniel Wang of Kirkland.