Students receive high honors

by Katie Barnes

October 19, 2009

     Derek Holmer and Lindsey Schroeder are both exceptional students that received honors by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation. To enter the competition students had to take the 2008 Preliminary SAT/ National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT).
    Holmer has been named as a commended student in the 2010 NMS program. Although he will not continue on in the competition, the commended students rank among the top five percent of more than 1.5 million students who entered the competition.
    Holmer explains how he feels about this great award he has received.
    “I feel honored to be in the top scores. This just goes to show what hard work and paying attention in class can do. Also, because Silver Lake doesn’t offer AP classes, I am hoping this may give me an edge for scholarships over those who took AP classes,” stated Holmer.
    Schroeder was named a Semifinalist in the program. The Semifinalists’, which is less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest scoring students in each state.
    Schroeder tells us how she feels about receiving such a great award.
    “I feel pretty good about it, I am proud to receive such a high honor,” states Schroeder.
Her final step in becoming a Finalist will include: having an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by her high school principal, and earn SAT scores that confirm the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test. Some 15,000 Semifinalists are expected to advance to Finalist level. The NMS program will be giving away around 8,200 Scholarships, having a total worth of more than 36 million. Schroeder will find out later if she was chosen and will receive scholarship money.
    The NMSC is a not-for-profit organization that was established in 1955. They work without government assistance with their own funds.