The National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced that 21 Alachua County Public School (ACPS) students earned semifinalist status in the 2025 National Merit Scholarship program.

Nearly 1.3 million students take the Preliminary SAT/National Scholarship Qualifying Test during their junior year, with 16,000 earning semifinalist status based on the test results.

The semifinalists will have the opportunity to earn finalist status. Along with earning high SAT scores, the semifinalists will need to submit applications highlighting their other academic achievements, honors and awards earned, leadership activities, write an essay and receive teacher recommendations.

Last year, 35 ACPS students earned semifinalist status.  

There are 10 students from Gainesville High School, six from Eastside and five from

Buchholz High School: Charles Austin, Andrew Caruso, Stuart Ding, Adrian Palamarev and Emily Zhou.

Eastside High School: Aagneya Banerjee, Henry Bostock, Joyce Huang, Yihan Wang, Chloe Zheng and Kyle Ziegler.

Gainesville High School: Elizabeth Chapman, Nathan Collier, Ava Fuller, Yoo-Min Koh, Kareem Meinel, Charlotte Shea, Aiden Swallow, William Thomas, Kallum Wang, Mathilde Wuthrich.