<p>@3girls3cats thanks very much!</p>
<p>Thanks for your help! 
</p>
<p>@3girls3cats – thanks for the link. I wonder why they include that – many kids I know have already changed their interests between fall of junior year and senior year. </p>
<p>Probably that data is most useful for colleges trying to narrow the focus of their mailing…STEM vs. humanities, etc.</p>
<p>D said they had 46. I’m guessing class size is roughly 1250.</p>
<p>Anyone have a link to the Louisiana list?</p>
<p>@vistajay - last year The Shreveport Times had the entire Louisiana list with the high schools and who made it two days after the press release. </p>
<p>Does anyone have SC information? I’m mostly interested in the Columbia area.</p>
<p>Looks like this is a SC announcement.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.enquirerherald.com/2014/09/10/3178143_national-merit-program-names-local.html?rh=1”>http://www.enquirerherald.com/2014/09/10/3178143_national-merit-program-names-local.html?rh=1</a></p>
<p>Holy moly! Our state’s cutoff dropped and my kid made it–I’d totally forgotten about this until I saw this post.</p>
<p>Except–he hasn’t taken the SAT. Argh! Now he’s gotta do that, especially since USC is on his list. He did so well on the ACT, I hate to throw another score into the mix, and many of his colleges require all scores to be submitted. What if it doesn’t go well?</p>
<p>U South Carolina has great benefits for NMFs who nominate the school. I suggest he register for October and prep a bit.</p>
<p>@usernamelm - Almost all schools look only at the applicant’s best scores. If you did not do as well on the SAT as you did on the ACT they will use your ACT. It is almost never to the student’s disadvantage to take a test again. Now if none of your child’s desired schools give a NMF scholarship then it may not be worth the effort, but since you never know if your child may change their mind in the process it’s probably worth the half day of time it takes to try it again. Best of luck!</p>
<p>DS fortunately did take the SAT last year, but for those who have not yet, no panic. Your son/daughter can take them as late as December, only the application has to be submitted in October, they’ll accept Nov. or Dec. SATs. Didn’t see anywhere that the ACTs are a substitute – College Board is the test-giver and the ACTs are a competitor. </p>
<p>I have the WI list. I looked around for local papers that had published short notices about local semifinalists and wrote to the reporters asking for a link to the full state list. One of them e-mailed the list to me. So that is something to try if you can’t find the list you want online. It worked for me. Our city newspaper has not publshed the list for our county yet. First time they didn’t do it on press release date. We have 2 largish cities.The other city’s newspaper says NMSF is ‘too small’ for them. </p>
<p>I am trying to upload and share this on docstoc but am not very tech savvy and it isn’t working as it should. Getting tech support, but that may take a couple of days. Anyone who wants it today PM me and tell me your e-mail address. Don’t put the ‘at’ character as then CC turns it into stars. Write it as emailaddress at yahoodotcom or something like that.</p>
<p>Does anyone has the full Texas list that we are seeing for some of the state that is willing to share/upload?</p>
<p>Illinois</p>
<p><a href=“http://adc.d211.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/2015-Semifinalists-Natl-Merit-Program.pdf”>http://adc.d211.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/2015-Semifinalists-Natl-Merit-Program.pdf</a></p>
<p>The student list from Central NJ is not complete. They don’t have my son’s HS at all, and I know of at least three semi-finalists from there (one had a 232…). So no freaking out please :)</p>
<p>Georgia </p>
<p><a href=“http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/news/documents/2014/09/11/NatMeritGA.pdf”>http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/news/documents/2014/09/11/NatMeritGA.pdf</a></p>
<p>FYI, some interesting observations about the CA semifinalist demographics:
<a href=“Interesting demographic glimpse of California National Merit Semifinalists - National Merit Scholarships - College Confidential Forums”>Interesting demographic glimpse of California National Merit Semifinalists - National Merit Scholarships - College Confidential Forums;
<p>@wolverine86 Thank you so much for the detailed info! I have understood most of that from my research—this kid is my oldest----but I am very concerned about a couple of things. First, what criteria eliminates the 1000 from advancing to finalist? Does anyone know? I have seen that it often has to do with something bad on their record—attendance, behavior, etc. Anyone have anything to add? My daughter’s score was pretty high—220—definitely for our state, but her SAT score was 2080. I don’t think I see the need for her to take it again but I am not sure. The other big question I have as I look at this app as opposed to what I have seen in things I have read from the NM site is that there is only one college that can be listed(didn’t there used to be TWO??) UGH! That seems like a lot of pressure. The school she really wants to attend is out of state and she should be quite competitive for their big scholarships to take care of most or all of her fees. However, there is no guarantee there because they told me they only give 1000 a year for NM. SO, in state she has the benefit of U of Kenucky, which basically pays their NM students to go to school there ( as far as I can see from the scholarships they offer to them.) The catch is you HAVE to choose them on that app. Any advice? </p>