The Lafayette Parish School System would like to congratulate the following students for being named semifinalists in the National Merit® Scholarship Program: Michelle J. Edavettal, David A. Gutierrez, Isaac Kim, and Maggie X. Lai from Lafayette High School. 

These four seniors were selected based on their academic achievements as well as their performance on the PSAT, which is the qualifying test for the National Merit Scholarship Program. Each of these students have 4.0 or above GPAs and will be eligible for many prestigious scholarships, which are often offered by colleges to National Merit finalists. 

About the National Merit® Scholarship Program

The National Merit Scholarship Program is an academic competition for recognition and scholarships that began in 1955. Approximately 1.5 million high school students enter the program each year.

Of the 1.5 million entrants, some 50,000 with the highest PSAT/NMSQT® Selection Index scores (calculated by doubling the sum of the reading, writing and language, and math test scores) qualify for recognition in the National Merit Scholarship Program.