WHEELING — A pair of Wheeling Park High School students have found themselves in rarified air among the high school seniors in the United States, announced as National Merit Scholarship semifinalists on Tuesday.

WPHS seniors Christopher Alkhouri and Nathan Tyska have been picked among around 16,000 semifinalists in the 71st annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 6,930 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $26 million that will be offered next spring.

As semifinalists, Alkhouri and Tyska are part of a group that represents less than 1% of United States high school seniors.

To be considered for a Merit Scholarship, semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. About 95% of semifinalists are expected to attain finalist standing, and approximately half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.

More than 1.3 million high school juniors in around 20,000 high schools entered the 2026 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2024 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The nationwide pool of semifinalists includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors.

To become a finalist, the semifinalist and a high school official must submit a detailed

scholarship application, in which they provide information about the semifinalist’s academic record, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment, and honors and awards received.

A semifinalist must have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and earn SAT or ACT scores confirming the student’s earlier performance on the qualifying test.

Finalists will be notified in Februrary and then, between April and July, students will be notified if they have received a scholarship from one of three groups — from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation itself, from one of 150 corporations or business organizations or from among 150 colleges and university that finance college-sponsored awards.

National Merit Scholarship winners of 2026 will be announced in four nationwide news releases beginning in April and concluding in July.

These scholarship recipients will join approximately 389,000 other distinguished young people who have earned the Merit Scholar title.