On June 4, National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced over 2,900 winners of National Merit Scholarships financed by U.S. colleges and universities. Officials of each sponsor college selected their scholarship winners from among the Finalists in the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program who plan to attend their institution. These awards provide between $500 and $2,000 annually for up to four years of undergraduate study at the institution financing the scholarship. An additional group of Scholars will be announced in July, bringing the total number of college-sponsored Merit Scholarship recipients in the 2025 competition to more than 3,600.

The announcement is the third National Merit Scholar release in 2025 by National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC®). NMSC named recipients of corporate-sponsored awards on April 23 and winners of National Merit® $2500 Scholarships on May 7. Additional recipients of college-sponsored awards will be announced on July 14. By the conclusion of this year’s competition, more than 6,930 academic champions will have won National Merit Scholarships worth approximately $26 million.

Winners from the greater Katy area include:

· Sripaad Gajula of Fulshear, Jordan High School. Probable career field: aerospace engineering.

· Katie M. Leisy of Fulshear, Jordan High School. Probable career field: medicine.

· Mohamed-Amin A. Abdalla of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: neurosurgery.

· Luisa A. Amir of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: electrical engineering.

· Kyla N. Bruns of Katy, Katy High School. Probable career field: statistics.

· Sania Chauhan of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: medicine.

· Eddy B. Chen of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: electrical engineering.

· Enze Chen of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: aerospace engineering.

· Trisha Das of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: law.

· Sahus K. Gupta of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: computer science.

· Daniel Jiang of Houston, Taylor High School. Probable career field: chemical engineering.

· Ian H. Kang of Katy, Cinco Ranch High School. Probable career field: actuarial science.

· Alexander Knight of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: mechanical engineering.

· Dorothy Li of Katy, Cinco Ranch High School. Probable career field: chemical engineering.

· Alvin T. Mathew of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: biomedical engineering.

· Dylan B. McCormick of Katy, Taylor High School. Probable career field: finance.

· Tejas Murali of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: mechanical engineering.

· Rohan A. Pandit of Katy, Cinco Ranch High School. Probable career field: computer programming.

· Matthew Parmenter of Katy, St. John XXIII College Preparatory. Probable career field: petroleum engineering.

· Pratyush Prakash of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: mechanical engineering.

· Luc-Andre Prieur du Perray of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: computer science.

· Roger Gabriel Ramos-Morales of Katy, Tompkins High School. Probable career field: biomedical engineering.

· Samaira Srivastva of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: biochemistry.

· Helene K. Su of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: biomedical engineering.

· Jonathan Maxwell Sutjandra of Katy, Seven Lakes High School. Probable career field: computer science.

· Inigo N. Tucker of Houston, Taylor High School. Probable career field: healthcare.

· Tristan I. Wardak of Katy, Jordan High School. Probable career field: mechanical engineering.

· Di Wu of Katy, Cinco Ranch High School. Probable career field: medicine.

This year, 146 higher education institutions are underwriting Merit Scholarship awards through the National Merit Scholarship Program. Sponsor colleges and universities include 74 private and 72 public institutions located in 42 states and the District of Columbia.

College-Sponsored Merit Scholarship Winners

College-sponsored Merit Scholarship winners announced today are a part of the distinguished group of more than 6,930 high school seniors who will receive National Merit Scholarships for college undergraduate study worth nearly $26 million. Earlier this spring, NMSC announced winners of corporate-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards and National Merit $2500 Scholarships.

2025 National Merit Scholarship Competition

High school juniors entered the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program when they took the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®), which served as an initial screen of program entrants. Last fall, 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 compete for Merit Scholarship awards, Semifinalists first had to advance to the Finalist level of the competition by fulfilling additional requirements. Each Semifinalist was asked to submit a detailed scholarship application, which included writing an essay and providing information about extracurricular activities, awards, and leadership positions. Semifinalists also had to have an outstanding academic record, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, and earn SAT® or ACT® scores that confirmed the qualifying test performance. From the Semifinalist group, over 15,000 met requirements for Finalist standing, and about half of the Finalists will be Merit Scholarship winners in 2025.

NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was established in 1955 to conduct the National Merit Scholarship Program. The majority of National Merit Scholarships provided each year are made possible by the support of approximately 280 independent corporate and

college sponsors. These sponsors join NMSC in its eff orts to enhance educational opportunities for America’s scholastically talented youth and to encourage the pursuit of academic excellence