By Ed Birch, Special Writer
At a recent South Brunswick Board of Education meeting, the district honored 39 high school seniors who were recognized as National Merit Achievement Scholarship Outstanding Participants and National Merit Commended Students.
Each student received a Certificate of Appreciation from Board President Stephen Parker and also honored a faculty member who they determined most influenced their educational career to date.
Competition for the honors is very steep.
The National Merit Scholarship Corporation recognizes the top 50,000 highest scoring students out of 1.5 million competitors on the previous year’s PSAT test, which serves as the qualifying examination.
The highest scoring 16,000 students nationwide are designated as semi-finalists. The remaining 36,000 students are designated as commended students. Outstanding participants are among the top three percent of all African-American students who competed in the examination, according to officials.
The Outstanding Participants honored were Victoria Monteiro, Breanna Ross, and Jhustin Scarlett.
At present, Ms. Montiero has been accepted to Rutgers, and is looking to major in English, political science, and philosophy.
Ms. Ross has been accepted to York College and Rutgers and is interested in majoring in political science and international relations.
Jhustin Scarlett has been accepted to Rutgers and is interested in bio-medical engineering.
The Commended Students and the colleges that the have been accepted to are as follows: Suraj Anandalwar, Rutgers; Akshata Bailken, Rutgers; Arjun Bakre, Rutgers and University of Michigan; Meghana Bansal, Rutgers; Sonia Bhutra, College of New Jersey; Anna Chen, Rutgers, University of Michigan; Yatharth Dubey, Georgia Tech, Northeastern, Rutgers; Natalie Falk, Rutgers, Ithaca; Ishaan Goel, Rutgers, Northeastern, Villanova, University of Michigan; Athira Haridas, Rutgers, Rider; Alex Hwang, Vassar; Sindhura Janjanam, Rutgers, University of Sciences of Philadelphia, Northeastern, University of Pittsburgh; Arisha Javed, Rutgers; Simone Klein, Virginia; Neha Krishnamachary, Rutgers, Northeastern, Penn State, Michigan, Villanova; Tanushree Laud, Rutgers; Adwait Lele, Rutgers, Michigan, Georgia Tech; Justin Lien, Illinois; Amisha Mehta, Rutgers; Dave Nacianceno, Rutgers, Pittsburgh, Stony Brook; Jehanzeb Nadeem, Rutgers; Aatish Nayak, Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Tech, Rutgers; Ketul Patel, Muchigan, Rutgers; Shivam Patel, Villanova, Penn State, Rutgers, NJIT, Temple; Sonali Patel, Rutgers; Khyati Prasad, Rutgers; Kevin Rajput, Rutgers, Boston College; Nandita Rao, Rutgers; Karen Reyes, NYU; Rahul Sane, Yale, Chicago, Stanford; Aadya Singh, Pennsylvania, Northwestern, Carnegie Mellon; Cindy Tang, Rutgers; Anirudh Vojjala, Rutgers; Aastha Wadhwa, Cornell; Manasa Xavier, Rutgers, University of Sciences at Philadelphia; and Stephanie Zheng, NYU.
Superintendent Dr. Gary McCartney recognized the district faculty and the parents of these students for being a major part of the educational system triangle that leads to student success year after year.
”This is certainly one of the best meeting nights of each year as we honor our honor students,” Board President Dr. Stephen Parker said
