Two 12th grade students from Baltimore City Public Schools have been named National Merit Scholarship Semifinalists.
Winton J. and Karun P., both from Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, earned the honor by scoring better than 99 percent of students on the 2025 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®).
Winton and Karun will now compete with more than 16,000 Semifinalists nationwide for about 6,700 National Merit Scholarships worth approximately $24 million. For the Finalist application, they will work with a school official to submit information about their academics, activities inside and outside of school, leadership, employment, honors, and awards.
More than 15,000 Finalists will be notified in February 2027. National Merit Scholarship winners will be announced from April through July 2027 for state-representational, corporate-sponsored, and college-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards.
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation has awarded more than 395,000 Merit Scholarships over the past 70 years.