Congratulations to National Merit Semi-Finalists

The National Merit Scholarship Corporation has announced that 34 Northwest Arkansas high school students have been named semifinalists in the 2008 National Merit Scholarship Program. A total of 148 Arkansas high school seniors were named semifinalists this year, and more than 10% of them were from Fayetteville High School. Congratulations!

Little Rock Central led the state with 17 semifinalists, and Fayetteville was second. Schools and students in Benton and Washington counties are as follows:
* Fayetteville High School (16): Bridgette S. Bailey, Victoria E. Bryan, Shidong Chen, Steven N. Haily, Alex T. Ivey, Louise Li, Harshavardhan A. Malshe, C. Tommy Peng, Zane A. Placke, Samantha G. Puckett, Paul W. St. Clair, Jane K. Thomason, Jeanne F. Vockroth, Guiming Xiao, Christina Z. Ye, David M. Zweig.
* Bentonville High School (4): Nicholas J. Deluca, Kelsey P. Robins, Brady L. Spencer, Benjamin J. Suchy.
* Springdale Har-Ber High School (4): Amy K. Golden, Matthew J. McCoy, Chris Ryan, John R. Tyson.
* Rogers High School (3): Daniel P. Dutcher, Jael G. Kimball, Aaron J. Miller.
* Farmington High School (2): Steven J. Doss, Kayla E. Kutter.
* Home School students (2): Emily Mires of Rogers; Jordan N. Roach of Siloam Springs.
* Haas Hall Academy (1): Levi J. Foster.
* Ambassadors for Christ Academy (1): Brandon E. Burns.
* Siloam Springs High School (1): Jacob D. Lee.

By my count, Washington County has 23, all from public schools, and Benton County has 11 (even giving them the private Christian Academy student and the two home schoolers). None were from the four area high schools on probation for not meeting state education requirements on course offerings and teacher qualifications -- West Fork, Prairie Grove, Decatur, and Gravette.