The National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) recently announced over 800 additional winners of National Merit Scholarships financed by colleges and universities. These Merit Scholar designees join more than 2,900 other college-sponsored award recipients who were announced in June.
Officials of each sponsor college selected their scholarship winners from among the National Merit Scholarship Program finalists who will attend their institution. College-sponsored awards provide between $500 and $2,000 annually for up to four years of undergraduate study at the institution financing the scholarship.
This year, 149 colleges and universities are sponsoring approximately 3,700 Merit Scholarship awards. Sponsor colleges include 77 private and 72 public institutions in 42 states and the District of Columbia.
This final group of winners brings the number of 2024 National Merit Scholars to more than 6,900. These distinguished high school graduates will receive scholarships worth nearly $26 million for undergraduate study. In addition to college-sponsored awards, two other types of National Merit Scholarships were offered—2,500 National Merit $2500 Scholarships, for which all Finalists competed, and about 770 corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards for Finalists who met criteria specified by their grantor organizations.
The four final winners for Cobb Schools hail from three high schools: Hillgrove, Pope, and Walton. One student will travel out of state to attend college (Fordham University in New York), while three will attend in Georgia (UGA and Emory). The winners are:
Kadrian M. Barnett, Hillgrove
Probable career field: Public Policy
Fordham University Scholarship
Paul W. Trotti III, Pope
Probable career field: Information Systems Management
University of Georgia Scholarship
Hunter J. Buchheit, Walton
Probable career field: Law
Emory University Scholarship
Emma J. Webb, Walton
Probable career field: Chemistry
University of Georgia Scholarship
Congratulations to all four graduates for being selected as National Merit Scholarship winners! We can’t wait to see what you’ll do in the next phase of your academic career.
More information about the 2024 National Merit Scholarship Competition:
This year’s competition for National Merit Scholarships began when high school juniors took the 2022 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. In September 2023, more than 16,000 Semifinalists were named on a state-representational basis in numbers proportional to each state’s percentage of the national total of graduating high school seniors. Semifinalists were the highest-scoring program entrants in each state and represented less than one percent of the nation’s seniors.
To become a Finalist, each Semifinalist had to complete a detailed scholarship application, which included writing an essay, describing leadership positions and contributions in school and community activities, showing an outstanding academic record, and being endorsed and recommended by a high school official. Semifinalists also had to take the SAT or ACT and earn scores that confirmed their performance on the initial qualifying test. From the Semifinalist group, over 15,000 attained Finalist standing, and about half of the Finalists were chosen to receive National Merit Scholarships.
NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was founded in 1955 to conduct the National Merit Scholarship Program. Over the past 69 years, approximately 382,000 outstanding young individuals have won National Merit Scholarships worth more than $1.3 billion. The majority of awards offered each year are underwritten by approximately 320 independent corporate and college sponsors that support NMSC’s efforts to recognize scholastically talented youth and encourage the pursuit of academic excellence.
