Godwin HS student earns National Merit Scholarship award
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A Mills Godwin High School student is one of 11 high school seniors in Virginia to earn a corporate-sponsored National Merit Scholarship award, announced today by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
Emily Yang earned a National Merit NewMarket Corporation Scholarship through the program, which in total awarded about 830 high school seniors with scholarship awards from about 124 corporations nationally.
NewMarket Corporation is the parent company of Afton Chemical Corporation and Ethyl Corporation. Merit Scholarship awards are part of NewMarket Foundation's aid to education programs, which include direct grants and matching gifts. Yang intends to enter the field of medicine after her collegiate studies.
Scholars were selected from students who advanced to the finalist level in the National Merit Scholarship competition and who met criteria of their scholarship sponsors. Corporate sponsors provide National Merit Scholarships for finalists who are children of their employees, who are residents of communities the company serves, or who plan to pursue college majors or careers the sponsor wishes to encourage.
Most of the awards are renewable for up to four years of college undergraduate study and provide annual stipends that range from $1,000 to $10,000 per year. Some provide a single payment between $2,500 and $5,000. Recipients can use their awards at any regionally accredited U.S. college or university of their choice.
High school juniors entered the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program when they took the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. In September 2024, more than 16,000 semifinalists were designated 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 be considered for a National Merit Scholarship, semifinalists had to fulfill requirements to advance to finalist standing. Each semifinalist was asked to complete 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 their qualifying test performance. From the semifinalist group, more than 15,000 met finalist requirements.
By the conclusion of the 2025 competition, more than 6,930 finalists will have been selected to receive National Merit Scholarships totaling nearly $26 million. Winners are the finalist candidates judged to have the strongest combination of academic skills and achievements, extracurricular accomplishments, and potential for success in rigorous college studies.
